668 


(881         A    REPLY 

^.M  UC-NRLF 


SB    310 


"AFflOL'SEBMD,BYOffi(raFOOLS." 


WILLIAM  L.vBOYALL, 


OF   T1IK   NKW    YOIIK.   BAR. 


\Tude.r  dam  nut nr  en  in   unmix  absolmtur." 


Htittion. 


With  sixty-four  <i,ltlitionat  page-*,  coutaininr/  2Jr.  Royall's  Rejoinder  to  Mr. 
Toiirfi^' «  Letter  <>/  Answer  in  the  New   York  Tribune. 


J. 


NEW  YORK: 
«Sc     SOIST, 

IT  MURKAY  STREET 

1881. 


A   REPLY 


TO 


"AFOOL'SERRAIBYONEOFTEEFOOLS." 


WILLIAM  L.  ROYALL, 
v\ 


THF  NEW  YORK  FAB 


'Judex  damnatur  cum  nocens  absolvitur! 


3E&ition. 


With  sixty-four  additional  pages,  containing  Mr.  Roy  all's  Rejoinder  to  Mr. 
Tom-gee's  tetter  of  Answer  in  the  New  York  Tribune. 


NEW  YORK : 
IE.    J.    H^VLE    <fc    SON      PUBLISHERS, 

17  MURRAY  STREET. 

1881. 


<- 


PREFACE. 


Ix  the  following  pages  I  have  endeavored  to  write 
the  truth,  and  I  have  written  it  without  regard  to  the 
matter  of  whom  it  may  hurt.  I  have  said  some  hard 
things,  and  I  have  not  attempted  to  soften  their  native 
ruggedness  by  sugar  coatings. 

I  look  upon  the  book  to  which  I  have  attempted  a 
reply  as  a  wilful,  deliberate,  and  malicious  libel  upon 
a  noble  and  generous  people,  amongst  whom  I  was 
born  and  raised,  and  in  full  sympathy  with  whom  I 
hope  to  live  and  die.  I  look  upon  its  author  as  one 
of  the  most  contemptible  fellows  of  those  who  have 
libelled  that  people,  and  not  at  all  less  contemptible 
because  highly  endowed  with  intellect  ;  but  rather 
more  so,  because,  with  all  the  disposition  towards 
grovelling  malice  which  a  weaker  man  could  have,  he 
has  yet  far  greater  powers  to  injure,  and  he  has  delib 
erately  used  those  powers  to  their  full  extent, 

I  have  made  no  mealy-mouthed  defence  of  the  people 
of  the  South.  It  is  not  on  bended  knee  and  with  cring 
ing  accent  that,  self-appointed  advocate  though  I  be,  I 
have  brought  their  cause  before  the  world.  I  have 
attempted  to  speak  for  a  race  of  whom  the  males  are 
men,  as  I  believe  those  men  would  have  their  race  spoken 
for. 


M  6284 


Writing  in  this  spirit,  I  feel  that  those  who  do  me 
the  honor  to  read  this  essay  are  entitled  to  know  some 
thing  of  who  and  what  I  am,  in  order  that  they  may  be 
the  better  able  to  judge  what  weight  is  to  be  given  to 
what  I  say. 

As  a  young  Virginian,  I  was  a  soldier  in  the  Con 
federate  army,  from  the  beginning  of  the  war  to  the 
end  of  it.  After  the  war  I  practised  law,  in  Richmond, 
Va.,  until  January,  1880,  when  I  founded  a  daily  news 
paper,  called  "  The  Commonwealth,"  and  edited  it  un 
til  August  1,  1880,  in  a  vain  endeavor,  along  with  the 
rest  of  the  "rebel  element"  there,  to  save  my  native 
State  from  the  infamous  brand  of  repudiation,  which 
the  Republicans  and  the  scalawag  native  white  popu 
lation  were  seeking  to  put  upon  her.  From  the  time 
that  repudiation  has  been  an  issue  in  Virginia  politics, 
I  have  been  prominently  connected  with  public  affairs 
there.  I  mention  these  things  to  show  that  I  have 
been  in  a  position  to  know  the  temper  and  feelings  of 
the  Southern  people.  I  do  not  perceive  that  anything 
further  personal  to  myself  would  be  interesting  or  use 
ful  to  the  public,  and  I  shall,  therefore,  proceed  with 
the  work  which  I  have  undertaken. 


"A  Fool's  mil,  iy  One  of  tie 

REPLIED    TO. 


CHAPTER  I. 

A   PRETENDER   UNMASKED. 

THIS  is  a  small  book  ;  but  it  would  be  difficult  to 
find  more  malice  in  a  large  one.  That  it  is  written  with 
great  cleverness,  it  is  needless  to  say.  The  popularity 
to  which  it  has  attained  is  the  surest  evidence  of  that. 
It  pretends  to  be  a  picture  of  life  and  manners  in  tl  e 
Southern  States.  Those  who  know  the  people  of  those 
States  know  it  to  be  no  picture,  but  they  recognize  in 
it  a  grotesque  caricature.  It  contains  just  enough  of 
truth  to  give  color,  skilfully  wrought  into  a  warp  and 
woof  of  suppressio  veri  and  suggestio  falsi.  Manifestly, 
the  writer  has  seen  much  of  the  life  and  ways  of  the 
people  of  the  South,  and  he  has  learned  much  of  those 
people.  Instead,  however,  of  using  his  knowledge  to 
represent  them  fairly,  he  has  used  it  to  misrepresent 
them.  Much  as  the  writer  has  seen  of  the  people  of  that 
section,  he  does  not  know  them.  He  could  not  paint  a 
picture  of  Southern  life,  if  he  tried — and  his  object  has 


:Ue  has^  manifestly  heard  a  good  deal 
of  the  negro  dialect*;1"  and  yelt  his  representations  of  that 
dialect  are  ridiculous  to  those  who  have  been  raised  with 
the  negro.  His  negro  conversations  are  no  more  like 
the  real  language  of  the  negro  than  a  Chinaman's 
pigeon  English  is  like  the  English  of  Herbert  Spencer. 
He  comes  about  as  near  representing  the  negro  dialect 
correctly,  as  the  Ethiopian  stage  players,  who  never  saw 
a  negro,  usually  come. 

Had  "  The  Fool"  possessed  the  knowledge  of  South 
ern  character  necessary  to  draw  it  to  the  life,  he  would 
never  have  blundered  here  ;  and  a  blunder  at  this 
point  inevitably  betrays,  to  the  knowing,  the  impostor 
who  pretends  that  he  understands  that  people. 

We  read,  in  the  eleventh  and  twelfth  chapters  of  the 
Book  of  Judges,  that  there  was  war  between  the  Ephra- 
imites  and  the  Gileadites,  and  that  the  Gileadites  slew 
many  of  the  Ephraimites,  even  unto  all  that  fell  into 
their  hands,  when  they  ascertained  that  they  were 
Ephraimites.  Therefore,  when  an  unlucky  wight  of  an 
Ephraimite  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  Gileadites,  it  is 
not  unnatural  that  he  should  have  denied  his  nation 
ality.  The  Gileadites,  however,  had  one  sure  test  for  an 
Ephraimite.  The  latter  could  not  pronounce  the  He 
brew  letter  sh  in  the  word  Shibboleth.  Consequently, 
when  a  stranger  was  suspected  of  being  an  Ephraimite, 
he  was  subjected  to  this  test,  and  if  the  answer  came 
Sibboleth,  off  went  his  head.  Milton  has  commemorated 
the  fact  in  the  following  lines  : 

"  Without  reprieve,  adjudged  to  death, 
For  want  of  well  pronouncing  Shibboleth." 


The  Ephraimites'  "  want  of  well  pronouncing  Shib 
boleth"  did  not  betray  him  more  surely  than  "  The 
Fool's"  ridiculous  negro  conversations  betray  him. 

When  a  writer  undertakes  to  describe  the  life  and 
manners  of  the  Southern  people,  and  makes  the  negroes 
talk  a  lingo  composed  in  part  of  accurate  and  correct 
English,  and  in  part  of  a  jargon  that  never  existed  any 
where,  save  in  the  imagination  of  some  one  who  supposed 
he  could  talk  their  language,  a  priori  we  know  that  he 
is  an  impostor,  and  is  dealing  with  a  subject  that  he  is 
utterly  incompetent  to  handle. 

Just  as,  by  the  same  token,  we  know  that  the  pre 
tended  soldier  who  can  give  you  marvellous  accounts  of 
his  exploits  during  the  war,  and  especially  at  the  battle 
of  Fredericksburg,  was  a  camp-follower  or  deserter,  or 
something  worse,  when  we  hear  him  talking  of  the  charge 
on  "  Saint  Marye's  Hill"  ("  Fool's  Errand,"  p.  133).* 
The  work  is  a  systematic  and  well-considered  libel  upon 
the  people  of  the  Southern  States  of  this  Union,  and  is 
very  well  calculated  to  do  them  a  most  foul  injury  and 
wrong. 

*  The  charge  was  on  the  hill  upon  which  Mr.  John  L.  Marye's 
house  is  situated.  "  The  Fool"  evidently  got  the  idea  in  his  head 
that  Marye  was  some  sort  of  corruption  of  Saint  Mary. 


CHAPTER  II. 

SOUTHERN    LIFE    AND    CHARACTER,    AS    PORTRAYED   BY 
"A   FOOL." 

"  A  FOOL'S  ERRAND"  purports  to  tell  the  story  of 
the  residence  of  a  Northern  man  who  had  served 
through  the  war  in  the  Federal  army,  in  the  Southern 
States,  from  the  year  1SG5  to  1877  or  1878.  This 
Northerner  had  gone  South  in  good  faith  to  dwell 
there  and  to  cast  in  his  lot  with  the  people  there.  It 
recounts  a  sad  life  for  him,  and  one  of  terrible  oppres 
sion  and  persecution,  due  to  the  fact  that  he  was  a 
Northern  man.  It  represents  the  white  people  as 
almost  unanimously  animated  with  the  most  intense, 
bitter,  and  savage  hatred  of  the  negro,  viewed  other 
wise  than  as  a  chattel,  as  property — viewed  as  a  com 
ponent  part  of  society — and  very  graphically  and 
powerfully  unfolds  a  story  of  wrong,  outrage,  and  op 
pression,  of  which  he  was,  through  years,  systemati 
cally  made  the  victim  by  the  white  people.  It  pretends 
to  tell  the  story  of  the  notorious  Ku-Klux  plots.  It 
represents  the  entire  white  population  of  the  South 
that  had  been  in  sympathy  with  the  Confederacy,  as 
actively  engaged  in  this  Ku-Klux  conspiracy,  which 
had  its  ramifications  in  every  county  and  neighborhood 
of  the  Southern  States,  and  which  beat,  hung,  and  shot 
negroes  by  the  thousands,  just  for  the  sport  of  the 
thing. 

To  be  sure  that  I  do  him  no  injustice,  I  will  quote  a 


few  passages  oat  of  the  many  in  which  "  The  Fool'* 
describes  the  state  of  affairs.  A  committee  of  citizens 
having  addressed  him  a  note  of  a  somewhat  warning 
character,  he  replies  to  it,  and  in  that  reply  he  says  : 

"  Of  course,  as  I  have  not  access  to  the  secret 
archives  of  the  Klan,  I  have  no  means  of  verifying  this 
estimate.  You  will  recollect  that  this  estimate  em 
braces  every  unlawful  act  perpetrated  by  armed  and 
organized  bodies  in  disguise.  The  entry  of  the  prem 
ises  and  surrounding  the  dwelling,  with  threats  against 
the  inmates  ;  the  seizure  and  destruction  or  appropri 
ation  of  arms  ;  the  dragging  of  men,  women,  and  chil 
dren  from  their  homes,  or  compelling  their  flight  j  the 
binding,  gagging,  and  beating  of  men  and  women  ; 
shooting  at  specific  individuals,  or  indiscriminately  at 
inhabited  houses  ;  the  mutilation  of  men  and  women  in 
methods  too  shocking  and  barbarous  to  be  recounted 
here  ;  burning  houses,  destroying  stock,  and  making 
the  night  a  terror  to  peaceful  citizens  by  the  ghastly 
horror  of  many  and  deliberate  murders"  (p.  221). 

Again,  describing  the  general  condition  of  the 
country,  he  says  (p.  226)  :  "A  strange  commentary 
upon  civilization  ;  a  strange  history  of  peaceful  years 
— bloody  as  the  reign  of  Mary,  barbarous  as  the  chron 
icles  of  the  Comanche.  Of  the  slain  there  were  enough 
to  furnish  forth  a  battle-field — and  all  from  those  three 
classes,  the  negro,  the  scalawag,  and  the  carpet-bagger 
— all  killed  with  deliberation,  overwhelmed  by  num 
bers,  roused  from  slumber  at  the  murk  midnight,  in 
the  hull  or  the  public  assembly,  upon  the  river  brink, 


10 

the  lonely  woods  road,  in  simulation  of  the  public  ex 
ecutioner — shot,  stabbed,  hanged,  drowned,  mutilated 
beyond  description,  tortured  beyond  conception,  *  *  * 
and  then  the  wounded — those  who  escaped  the  harder 
fate — the  whipped,  the  mangled,  the  bleeding,  the  torn  ! 
men  despoiled  of  manhood  !  women  gravid  with  dead 
children  !  bleeding  backs  !  broken  limbs  !  Ah  !  the 
wounded  in  this  silent  warfare  were  more  thousands 
than  those  who  groaned  upon  the  slopes  of  Gettysburg  ! 
Dwellings  and  schools  and  churches  burned  !  People 
driven  from  their  homes  and  dwelling  in  the  woods  and 
fields  !  The  poor,  the  weak,  the  despised,  maltreated 
and  persecuted." 

In  this  wholesale  game  of  murder,  rapine,  and  plun 
der,  "  The  Fool"  represents  that  the  entire  white  pop 
ulation  of  the  South — save  those  that  were  attached 
during  the  war  to  the  Union — took  hands,  and  all  from 
a  bitter,  malignant,  unyielding  hatred  for  the  negro  as 
a  component  part  of  society.  By  consequence,  too,  he 
represents  that  they  extended  this  feeling  to  all  per 
sons  who  came  from  the  North.  At  page  155  he  says  : 
"  Whatever  or  whoever  was  of  the  North  or  from  the 
North  was  the  subject  of  ridicule,  denunciation,  and  im 
measurable  malignity  and  vituperation." 

This  is  the  picture  of  a  fearful  social  condition,  and 
if  it  were  a  correct  one,  it  would  justify  \ery  serious 
reflection  at  the  hands  of  philanthropists  generally. 
That  it  is  as  false  as  hell  itself,  every  man  who  has  lived 
in  the  South  knows  perfectly  well. 

That  during  what  is  known  as  the  period  of  recon- 


11 

struction,  in  several  of  the  Southern  States  there 
were  violence,  disorder,  and  possibly  outrage,  no 
candid  Southerner  will  deny.  But  that  there  was  any 
such  state  of  affairs  as  "  The  Fool"  represents  —  a 
wholesale  plot  in  which  all  or  any  considerable  por 
tion  of  the  people  were  engaged — every  man,  woman, 
and  child  who  knows  anything  of  the  subject,  knows  to 
be  ridiculous.  And  yet,  I  doubt  not  that  this  "  Fool's" 
picture  of  the  state  of  society  in  the  South  will  be 
accepted  by  the  world  as  drawn  to  nature.  The 
Northern  and  Western  parts  of  this  Union  are  blessed 
with  a  credulity  touching  all  matters  which  tend  to 
bring  the  white  people  of  the  Southern  States  into 
disgrace  and  contempt,  which,  as  an  article  of  faith, 
would  meet  the  requirements  of  all  that  the  most 
enthusiastic  professor  of  the  Christian  religion  could 
ask  for.  No  story,  however  monstrous,  which  repre 
sents  a  Southern  community  in  an  attitude  of  violence 
and  defiant  turbulence,  is  too  gross  for  Northern  belief. 
The  typical  idea  of  the  Southerner  is  that  of  a  long, 
lank  man,  with  scraggy  hair  and  beard,  and  broad- 
brimmed,  slouch  hat,  who  has  no  less  than  two 
revolvers  always  concealed  about  his  person,  which  he 
will  immediately  use  with  deadly  effect,  whenever  an 
opportunity  to  trespass  upon  some  other  person's  rights 
occurs.  Without  taking  the  trouble  to  inform  them 
selves  correctly  touching  the  people  of  the  South,  they 
accept  any  derogatory  story  that  timid  sensationalists 
or  designing  scoundrels  may  choose  to  invent,  as  the 
truth  regarding  those  people.  I  have  met  frequently 
with  curious  and  absurd  illustrations  of  this. 


12 

Colonel  S ,  of  South  Carolina,  related  to  me  an 

amusing  instance  of  it.  A  few  years  back  he  was  re 
turning  home  from  a  summer's  sojourn  at  the  Green- 
brier  White  Sulphur  Springs  of  West  Virginia,  by  way 
of  Richmond,  Va.  On  the  way,  two  gentlemen  got  on 
the  train,  returning  from  the  Hot  Springs  in  Bath 
County,  Virginia,  where  they  had  been  for  some  time, 
taking  the  hot  baths  for  rheumatism.  One  was  a  Mr. 

A ,   of  Boston,   and  the  other  an  acquaintance  of 

Colonel  S ,  Mr.   B ,  of  Charleston,   S.  C.     They 

had  become  well  acquainted  with  each  other,  and  had 
frequently  talked  over  the  condition  of  the  South. 

Mr.  B was  a  Ion  vivant,  and  was  very  fond  of  what 

was  good  to  drink  as  well  as  of  what  was  good  to  eat. 

In  the  course  of  the  journey  he  came  to  Colonel  S , 

and  told  him  that  the  gentleman  from  Boston  had 
some  of  the  finest  brandy  he  had  ever  seen  ;  that  he 
had  given  him  two  drinks  of  it,  but  he  wanted  another, 
and  was  ashamed  to  ask  him  for  it.  "  Come,"  says  he, 
"  let  me  introduce  you  to  him,  and  he'll  oiler  you  a 
drink,  and  in  that  way  I'll  get  another."  Colonel 

S thanked  him,  but  begged  to  be  excused.      Soon 

afterwards    he   saw    B talking    very   confidentially 

to    A ,  and   nodding    significantly  at   himself,  and 

very  soon  the  two  came  up,  and  Mr.  A—  -  was  pre 
sented  to  Colonel  S .  A seemed  very  anxious 

to  play  the  agreeable,   and  offered  the  party  some  of 

his  brandy.     In  this  way  B got  his  drink. 

When  the  party   arrived   in   Richmond,   B—  -  went 
on  through,  but  Colonel  S and  his  Boston   friend 


13 

stopped.     They  went  to  their  rooms  and  dressed,  and 

soon    after,    the    Bostonian    meeting     Colonel    S , 

asked  him  to  go  over  to  the  bar  and  get  a  julep.     S — 
asked  to  be  excused. 

"  Oh,"  says  A ,  "  don't  you  mind  me.     I'm  all 

right.  I  wouldn't  tell  on  you  for  the  world.  I  don't 
care  how  many  of  them  are  killed." 

On   hearing   this   S took  in   the  situation.      He 

saw  at  once  that  B ,    to  get  his  drink   of   brandy, 

had  told  some  story  on  him  that  would  excite  the  Bos- 
tonian's  interest  and  would  thus  lead  him  to  seek 

S 's  acquaintance,  when  an  offer  of  the  brandy  to 

the    party    would    follow.     He    therefore    went    with 

A to   the   bar.       Whilst   standing   there   he   said, 

"  What  tale  did  B tell  you  about  me,  anyhow  ?" 

"  Oh,"  says  A ,  "  don't  you  mind  me  ;  I'm  not 

going  to  tell  on  you.  I  don't  care  if  you  was  to  kill  all 
of  them." 

"But  what,"  says  S ,   "did  he    tell  you  about 

me?" 

"  Oh,"  says  A ,  "your  friend  told  me  all  about 

your  troubles.  He  told  me  about  your  being  a  Ku- 
Klux,  and  having  killed  those  three  negroes,  and 
about  your  being  up  here  in  the  mountains  hiding 
around  to  keep  from  being  caught." 

"  Now    that    just    shows,"    said   S ,    "  how   you 

people  get  fooled.  I'm  no  Ku-Klux,  and  I  never  killed 
a  negro  in  my  life.  I'm  not  that  sort  of  a  man." 

"  Oh,  never  you  mind,"  said  A ;  "  I'm  all  right. 

I'm  not  going  to  tell  on  you.  You  can  just  feel  per 
fectly  satisfied  about  that." 


14 

And  he  parted  with  S under  the  full  belief  that 

he  was  a  terrible  Ku-Klux,  and  has,  no  doubt,  many 
times  since  made  his  children's  hair  stand  on  end  with 
accounts  of  the  desperate,  ruffianly  Ku-Klnx  that  ho 
met  on  that  trip.  Mr.  Conkling  would  do  well  to  put 
the  account  of  these  three  murders  into  his  scrap-book 
to  swell  the  list  of  the  helpless  negroes  who  have  been 
assassinated. 

I  will  mention  another  ridiculous  thing  of  this  sort 
that  came  under  my  observation. 

After  Mr.  Tilden  had  been  elected  President  of  the 
United  States,  but  before  Mr.  Hayes  took  his  seat,  a 
wag  came  into  the  city  of  Richmond  one  evening  on  a 
crowded  train.  There  was,  as  usual,  a  large  crowd  of 
idle,  lazy  negroes  standing  around  the  depot.  This 
wag  jumped  off  amongst  them,  and  commenced  going 
from  one  to  another,  making  a  cross  mark  with  a  piece 
of  chalk  on  the  back  of  each.  Somebody  asked  what 
he  was  doing  it  for.  "  Oh,"  says  he,  "  Mr.  Tilden  sent 
me  word  that  I  could  have  all  I  could  mark."  A  panic 
ensued  amongst  the  negroes,  which  extended  very 
considerably  beyond  those  at  the  depot.  I  afterwards 
heard  of  this  thing  being  seriously  told  out  in  Minne 
sota  as  an  evidence  of  a  desire  and  purpose  upon  the 
part  of  the  Southern  people  to  re-enslave  the  negroes 
if  they  could. 


15 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE   REAL  SITUATION"  AT   THE  SOUTH — THE   CARPET 
BAGGERS — A.  W.  TOURGEE. 

HE  who  would  really  understand  the  present  state  of 
affairs  in  the  South,  and  the  temper  and  feeling  of  the 
people  toward  the  negro  and  toward  the  Government, 
must  take  a  retrospective  view  of  society  there  for  the 
past  twenty  years. 

In  I860  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  a  large  part  of 
the  population  of  the  Southern  States  was  opposed  to 
a  secession  of  those  States  from  the  Union.  But  when 
once  the  act  of  secession  was  accomplished  and  the 
tocsin  of  war  had  sounded,  the  entire  white  popula 
tion,  almost  as  one  man,  became  ardent  sympathizers 
with  the  Confederacy,  and  earnest  supporters  of  its 
cause.  Leaving  out  of  view  an  inconsiderable  part  of 
the  mountains  of  the  South,  and  leaving  out  of  the 
account  such  cowardly  vagabonds  as  would  profess 
friendship  for  one  cause  or  another,  according  as  the 
immediate  profession  would  tend  to  save  their  persons 
from  the  risk  of  war — persons  who  were  no  more 
friendly  to  the  Union  than  to  the  Confederacy,  but 
who  were  eternally  friendly  to  themselves  alone — it 
would  be  safe  to  say  that  after  the  date  when  the  first 
battle  of  Manassas  was  fought  there  were  not  twenty- 
five  persons  in  any  one  of  the  Southern  States  who  did 
not  sympathize  heart  and  soul  with  the  Confederacy  and 
its  cause. 


16 

"  The  Fool"  has  represented  that  there  was  a  con 
siderable  body  of  the  people  that  remained  true  all 
through  the  war  to  the  Union,  who  exhibited  the 
highest  heroism  in  defying  the  Confederacy,  and  who 
were  subjected  to  outrageous  treatment  for  their 
loyalty  to  the  United  States.  This  is  all  the  merest 
bosh  and  stuff.  Let  any  man  name  the  individuals  in 
any  neighborhood  who  sympathized  with  the  Union, 
and  I  will  undertake  to  show  them  to  have  been  a  set 
of  selfish,  cowardly  skulkers  from  military  service,  with 
a  rare  exception  here  and  there. 

It  is  altogether  a  mistake,  too,  to  believe,  as  many 
Xortheners  do,  and  as  "  The  Fool"  would  represent, 
that  the  lower  orders  of  society  were  dragooned  into  sup 
port  of  the  Confederacy  by  the  dominating  higher  and 
slave-holding  class.  The  institution  of  slavery,  leaving 
the  slave-owner  great  leisure  time,  gave  greater  oppor 
tunities  for  the  cultivation  of  all  those  relations  of  life 
which  tend  to  produce  individuality  of  character,  than 
any  other  condition  of  life  of  which  we  have  an  ac 
count.  Each  slave-owner,  producing  from  his  own 
resources  almost  everything  that  was  necessary  to  life, 
was  independent,  in  a  measure,  of  every  one  else,  and, 
being  under  no  necessity  to  exert  himself  in  the  way  of 
manual  toil,  his  attention  was  principally  engaged  with 
what  goes  in  the  direction  of  the  ornamentation  and 
embellishment  of  life.  The  individuality  of  character 
which  this  mode  of  life  tended  to  arouse  was  not  con 
fined  to  those  who  were  slave-owners  ;  it  extended  from 
them,  by  contagion,  to  all  orders  of  life.  The  "  poor 


17 

white  man"  was  as  prompt  to  resent  any  apparent 
trespass  upon  his  rights  or  personal  dignity  at  the 
hands  of  his  rich  neighbor,  as  the  rich  neighbor  would 
have  been  to  resent  the  same  thing  at  the  hands  of  his 
social  peer.  Many  a  court  green  has  witnessed  a  rich 
slave-owner  receive  a  black  eye  and  a  bloody  nose  from 
a  "  poor  white  man"  of  his  neighborhood  in  retaliation 
for  some  slight  which  the  poor  man  took  as  an  indig 
nity.  This  individuality  of  the  people  was  exhibited 
in  a  marked  manner  in  their  jury  trials.  All  orders  of 
the  white  people  were  liable  to  jury  service  in  Virginia, 
and  I  think  I  should  risk  nothing  in  saying,  that  in  the 
thirty  years  preceding  the  war,  there  were  more  hung 
juries  in  the  State  of  Virginia  than  in  the  States  of 
New  York,  New  Hampshire,  Connecticut,  Massachu 
setts,  and  Maine  combined,  during  the  same  period. 
Each  man,  therefore,  of  the  population,  went  into  the 
movement  for  the  establishment  of  the  Confederacy, 
from  his  own  desire  to  see  it  established,  and  not  be 
cause  he  was  driven  into  it  by  terror  of  his  more  power 
ful  neighbor.  They  made  a  fierce  and  a  desperate 
struggle  to  accomplish  their  end,  fully  aware  of  what 
was  at  stake,  but  in  no  measure  intimidated  by  the 
possibility  of  defeat.  Having  exhausted  themselves, 
they  threw  down  their  arms  with  the  most  unreserved 
purpose  of  abiding  by  the  issue.  They  recognized  the 
judgment  of  the  tribunal  to  which  they  had  appealed 
as  deciding  two  things  :  first,  that  there  existed  no 
right  or  power  in  any  State  to  withdraw  from  this 
Union,  but  that  it  was,  in  the  language  of  the  Supreme 


18 

Court,  ';  an  indissoluble  union  of  indissoluble  States  ;" 
and  second,  that  the  institution  of  slavery  was  to  be 
forever  at  an  end  in  the  Southern  States.  Having 
appealed  to  the  tribunal  of  arms,  declaring  that  before 
that  tribunal  they  would  make  good  the  other  side  of 
both  these  propositions,  and  their  chosen  tribunal 
having  decided  against  them  on  both  points,  it  never 
entered  into  their  heads  to  say  or  do  one  thing  that 
could  be  said  to  be  in  contravention  of  the  judgment  that 
it  had  pronounced. 

They  accepted  the  result  of  the  war  as  having  settled 
both  these  points,  and  having  placed  them  beyond,  the 
domains  of  controversy.  They  looked,  however,  with 
the  utmost  horror  and  dismay  upon  the  suggestion 
that  the  ballot  was  to  be  placed  in  the  hands  of  their 
former  slaves.  With  the  disfranchise  men  ta  imposed 
upon  themselves,  they  saw  that  this  might  well  lead  to 
the  entire  rule  and  dominion  of  each  State  passing 
into  the  hands  of  those  slaves.  They  reflected  that 
themselves  were  a  proud  and  haughty  people,  de 
veloped  by  the  habits  and  modes  of  thought  of  gen 
erations  into  a  race  peculiarly  sensitive  to  whatever 
may  have  the  appearance  of  personal  indignity.  They 
saw  the  African,  on  the  other  hand,  totally  destitute 
of  every  element  in  human  character  that  governmental 
aptitude  demands.  Neither  he  nor  any  generation  of 
his  ancestors  had  ever  had  any  instruction  in  those 
matters  that  are  essential  to  a  just  appreciation  of  the 
responsibilities  of  a  ruler.  His  ancestor  had  been 
brought  to  this  country  a  savage — to  bring  him  here 


19 

he  had  been  trapped  and  lassoed  in  the  jungles  of  his 
native  forest  as  men  hunt  wild  beasts.  The  negro's 
position  after  coming  here  had  been  more  that  of  a 
domestic  animal  than  of  a  member  of  society. 

How  could  the  dominant  race,  being  a  race  such  as 
the  Southern  people  are,  look  upon  the  prospect  of  com 
plete  dominion  over  themselves,  passing  by  one  single 
move  to  these  their  former  slaves,  without  considering 
it  one  of  the  most  fearful  throes  and  revolutions  to 
which  society  could  fall  a  victim  ?  Who  can  blame 
them  for  looking  upon  this  as  the  very  worst  evil  that 
could  befall  them  ?  Who  can  blame  them  if  they 
should  have  determined  to  die  rather  than  see  it  ac 
complished  ?  Who  can  deny  that  to  their  minds  it 
was  the  same  thing  as  turning  themselves  over  to  plun 
der,  murder,  and  rapine  ?  Suppose  that  by  some  sweep 
of  a  magician's  wand  it  should  be  so  ordained  that  the 
monkeys  in  Africa  should  become  the  dominating  race 
there,  and  that  the  men  and  women  of  Africa's  wastes 
should  bo\v  their  heads  in  submission  to  monkey  rule. 
Who  is  he,  bearing  the  form  and  semblance  of  a  man, 
who  would  not  share  in  the  indignation  of  the  human 
beings  there,  and  who  would  not  justify  them  in 
opposing  this  dominion,  whether  by  shot-gun  or  by 
fraud  ?  How  could  fraud  be  predicated  upon  resistance 
to  such  a  state  of  things  ? 

Lieutenant- Colonel  Napier,  of  the  British  army,  who 
has  perhaps  seen  the  Bushman  of  Southern  Africa  to 
as  much  advantage  as  any  other  person,  has  given  the 
following  graphic  picture  of  him  : 


20 

"  The  Dutch  Boer,  the  Griqua,  the  Bcchuana,  the 
Kaffir,  all  entertain  the  same  dread  of,  and  aversion 
to,  those  dwarfish  hordes,  who,  armed  with  their 
diminutive  bows  and  poisoned  arrows,  recklessly  plun 
der  and  devastate,  without  regard  either  to  nation  or 
color,  and  are  in  their  turn  hunted  down  and  destroyed 
like  beasts  of  prey,  which,  in  many  respects,  they  re 
semble.  Time,  a  knowledge  of  and  an  occasional  inter 
course  with  people  more  civilized  than  themselves, 
have  made  little  change  in  the  habits  and  disposition 
of  this  extraordinary  race.  The  Bushman  still  con 
tinues  unrelentingly  to  plunder,  and  cruelly  to  destroy, 
Whenever  the  opportunity  presents  itself.  His  resi 
dence  is  still  amongst  inaccessible  hills,  in  the  rude 
cave  or  cleft  of  the  rock,  on  the  level  karroo,  in  the 
shallow  burrow,  scooped  out  with  a  stick,  and  sheltered 
with  a  frail  mat.  He  still,  with  deadly  effect,  draws 
his  diminutive  bow,  and  shoots  his  poisoned  arrows 
against  man  and  beast.  Disdaining  labor  of  any  kind, 
he  seizes  when  he  can  on  the  farmer's  herds  and  flocks, 
recklessly  destroys  what  he  cannot  devour,  wallows 
for  consecutive  days  with  vultures  and  jackals  amidst 
the  carcasses  of  the  slain,  and,  when  fully  gorged  to 
the  throat,  slumbers  in  lethargic  stupor  like  a  wild 
beast,  till,  aroused  by  hunger,  he  is  compelled  to 
wander  forth  again  in  quest  of  prey. 

"  When  he  cannot  plunder  cattle,  he  eagerly  pursues 
the  denizens  of  the  waste,  feasts  indifferently  upon  the 
lion  or  the  hedgehog,  and,  failing  such  dainty  mor 
sels,  philosophically  contents  himself  with  roots,  bulbs, 


21 

locusts,  ants,  pieces  of  hide  steeped  in  water,  or,  as  a 
last  recourse,  lie  tightens  his  girdle  of  famine,  and  as 
Pringle  says, 

"  '  He  lays  him  down,  to  sleep  away, 
In  languid  trance,  the  weary  day.' 

11  Whether  this  precarious  mode  of  existence  may  or 
may  not  have  influenced  the  personal  appearance  of 
the  Bushmen,  it  is  difficult  to  say,  but  a  more  wretched 
looking  set  of  beings  cannot  be  easily  imagined.  The 
average  height  of  the  men  is  considerably  under  five 
feet,  that  of  the  women  little  exceeding  four.  Their 
shameless  state  of  nearly  complete  nudity,  their  brutal 
ized  habits  of  voracity,  filth,  and  cruelty  of  disposi 
tion,  appear  to  place  them  completely  on  a  level  with 
the  brute  creation  ;  whilst  the  clicking  tones  of  a  lan 
guage,  composed  of  the  most  unpronounceable  and  dis 
cordant  noises,  more  nearly  resemble  the  jabbering  of 
apes  than  sounds  uttered  by  human  beings. ' ' 

Suppose  that  through  some  social  convulsion  these 
Bushmen  should  be  ordered  into  power  and  control 
over  their  neighbors,  the  Dutch  Boer,  the  Griqua,  the 
Bechuana,  or  the  Kaffir.  Would  it  be  expected  that 
the  latter  should  submit  to  the  rule  ?  Would  they  not 
rise  in  the  majesty  of  their  nature  and  protest  that  it 
was  a  mockery  of  human  government  to  force  human 
beings,  developed  to  their  point  in  civilization,  to  bow 
in  obedience  to  the  rule  of  such  beasts  as  these  ? 
They  would,  and  every  man,  woman,  and  child  on  this 
earth  who  knows  the  sentiments  of  human  nature, 
would  clap  and  applaud  the  act. 


22 

I  do  not  of  course  mean  to  say  that  the  civilization 
of  the  Southern  negro  is  advanced  no  further  than  that 
of  the  Bushman.  But  I  do  mean  to  say  that  the  differ 
ence  between  the  civilization  of  the  Bushman  and  that 
of  any  of  his  neighbors,  the  Kaffir  for  instance,  is  not  so 
wide  as  that  between  the  Southern  negro  and  the 
Southern  white.  I  mean  to  say  that  there  would  be 
more  show  of  reason  to  force  the  Kaffir  to  submit  to 
the  rule  of  the  Bushman  than  there  would  be  to  force 
the  Southern  white  man  to  submit  to  the  rule  of  the 
Southern  negro. 

It  altogether  fails  to  meet  the  exigencies  of  the  case 
to  say  that  the  Southern  people,  having  held  the 
negroes  in  their  state  of  slavery,  are  themselves  re 
sponsible  for  their  present  state  of  civilization.  This 
is  not  a  question  as  to  who  is  responsible  for  the  con 
dition  of  things  ;  it  is  an  inquiry  as  to  what  is  the  real 
condition.  \Yhoever  may  be  responsible,  the  fact 
nevertheless  exists,  that  the  negro  in  his  present  state 
is  not  fitted  to  be  put  in  dominion  over  the  white 
people,  and  that  conclusion  being  arrived  at,  disputes 
as  to  who  is  responsible  for  the  situation  will  do  for 
the  entertainment  of  the  male  and  female  old  women  ; 
but  statesmen  and  practical  people  have  no  time  for 
them. 

Now,  from  the  very  ending  of  the  war  the  Federal 
Government  exhibited  a  fixed  determination  to  force 
the  white  people  of  the  South  to  bow  their  necks  to 
the  negroes'  yoke.  It  was  decreed  that  a  race,  trans 
formed  in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye  from  slave  to  free, 


23 

should  be  placed  in  absolute  power  over  the  race  that 
for  generations  had  held  them  as  slaves.  This  was 
contrary  to  nature,  and  it  was  not  reasonable  to  sup 
pose  that  it  could  be  done  without  producing  violent 
social  commotions.  I  will  not  deny  that  there  have 
been  such  ;  but  that  they  were  not  so  violent  as  to 
drape  the  entire  land  in  mourning,  is  the  only  surpris 
ing  thing  about  the  whole  matter. 

From  the  very  ending  of  the  war  the  edict  went 
forth  from  Washington  that  no  man  should  hold  office 
in  the  Southern  States  who  could  not  swear  that  he 
had  had  no  sympathy  with  the  Confederacy.  As  the 
entire  white  population  had  been  in  earnest  sympathy 
with  the  Confederacy,  this  confined  the  possibility 
of  governmental  agencies  to  the  negroes  and  such 
strangers  as  might  happen  to  come  there.  No  negroes 
could  be  found  who  were  competent  to  discharge  the 
offices  of  government,  which  practically  confined  the 
incumbency  of  office  to  the  strangers  who  might  hap 
pen  to  offer  themselves.  There  was  no  lack  of  these. 
The  number  who  were  willing  to  forego  all  the  enjoy 
ments  of  their  own  homes  to  assist  in  the  patriotic 
duty  of  "  reconstructing  the  rebel  States,"  was  equal 
to  what  the  most  enthusiastic  patriot  could  have  hoped 
from  his  countrymen,  and  the  utter  unselfishness  with 
which  they  took  possession  of  every  office  that  had  a 
salary  attached  to  it  was  in  perfect  keeping  with  the 
patriotism  of  their  natures.  The  whole  South  was  at 
once  overrun  with  the  larvae  of  the  North.  Wherever 
there  dwelt  a  scoundrel,  who  feared  that  his  neighbors 


24 

would  give  him  his  deserts  in  the  form  of  a  coating  of 
tar  and  feathers,  that  neighborhood  lost  a  citizen,  and 
the  South  gained  an  apostle  of  reconstruction.  When 
ever  the  womb  of  the  North  revolted  at  its  burden, 
and  spewed  forth  some  putrid  mass  of  crime,  the  South 
received  a  patriot  who  knew  nothing  but  "  restoration 
of  the  Union/'  and  devotion  to  the  "  poor  downtrodden 
negro."  These  vultures  and  harpies  came  into  every 
neighborhood  where  an  office  was  to  be  filled.  They 
inflamed  the  minds  of  the  negroes  with  sensational 
stories  of  a  determination  on  the  part  of  the  white  peo 
ple  to  re-enslave  them.  They  made  them  believe  that 
unless  they  organized  themselves,  and  stood  shoulder 
to  shoulder,  the  white  people  would  again  reduce  them 
to  slavery.  They  organized  them  into  what  were 
called  "  Union  Leagues" — organizations  that  had  but 
one  watchword,  opposition  to  the  whites.  These  "  car 
pet-baggers,"  for  this  was  the  name  with  which  the 
people  dubbed  them,  had  but  one  purpose  in  all  this, 
and  that  was  to  use  the  negroes'  ballots  to  put  them 
selves  into  all  the  offices  in  each  State.  Backed  by 
the  Federal  Government  they  succeeded,  and  from  the 
time  that  their  governments  were  established  they 
bent  all  the  energies  of  their  natures  to  swindling  and 
plundering  the  people  in  every  possible  way.  They 
stole  directly  and  they  stole  indirectly.  They  robbed 
the  public  treasuries  of  every  dollar  they  contained, 
and  then  increased  the  taxes  of  the  people  to  replenish 
them  that  they  might  have  more  to  steal.  When  all 
was  absorbed  that  these  sources  would  furnish,  they 


25 

created  the  States'  bonds,  sold  them  for  twenty-five 
and  thirty  cents  on  the  dollar,  and  stole  that,  leaving 
the  people  with  the  burden  of  the  bonds  upon  them. 
All  this  by  men  who  had  no  particle  of  interest  in  the 
country,  except  in  that  part  of  it  which  they  carried 
upon  their  dirty  persons.  No  people  was  ever  afflicted 
by  such  a  curse  as  the  Southern  people  were  afflicted 
by  in  these  carpet-baggers.  ^Eneas  must  have  had 
them  in  his  prophetic  eye  when,  three  thousand  years 
ago,  he  described  the  harpies  with  which  he  met  on  the 
islands  of  Strophades. 

"  Tristius  liaud  illis  monslrum  nee  saevior  ulla 
Pestis  et  ira  Deum  Stygiis  sese  exlulit  undis. 
Virpfmei  volucrum  vultus,  foedissima  ventris 

Proluvies,  unccequse  manus,  et  pallida  semper  ora  fames.'* 

I  will  give  one  illustration  of  the  way  in  which  these 
harpies  plundered  the  people.  The  town  of  Vioks- 
burg,  Mississippi,  contained,  in  1868,  about  thirteen 
thousand  inhabitants,  of  which  about  six  thousand 
were  negroes,  and,  therefore,  non-property-holders  and 
non-tax-payers.  It  owed  nothing  at  that  time,  and  the 
rate  of  taxation  was  very  small.  In  18G8  Vicksburg 
passed  into  the  hands  of  a  carpet-bagger  government, 
under  which  it  rested  until  1872.  In  that  time,  those 
carpet-baggers  had  caused  the  rate  of  taxation  to  be 
raised  to  six  per  cent,  on  a  heavy  assessment  of  prop 
erty,  and  they  had  fastened  upon  the  town  a  bonded  debt 
of  six  hundred  thousand  dollars,  bearing  ten  per  cen 
interest,  and  a  floating  debt  of  over  one  hundred  thou 
sand  dollars.  Having  destroyed  the  credit  of  the  place, 


26 

they  issued  the  scrip,  representing  the  floating  debt,  at 
from  forty  to  sixty  cents  on  the  dollar — that  is,  for  an 
article  worth  five  dollars  they  would  give  the  town's 
promise  to  pay  ten  dollars.  Fifty  thousand  dollars  would 
pay  for  all  that  was  done  with  all  the  money  received,  in 
consideration  of  this  load  of.  debt. 

It  requires  no  careful  reading  of  "  A  Fool's  Errand" 
to  discover  that  "  The  Fool"  was  one  of  these  carpet 
baggers,  and  that  his  errand  to  the  South  was  that  of 
his  fellows.  Fortunately,  we  are  not  left  to  the  evidence 
which  his  book  furnishes,  of  the  purposes  for  which  he 
went  South.  We  have  the  good  luck  to  have  other  and 
complete  outside  evidence  upon  those  points. 

From  the  close  of  the  war  until  1871,  the  good  old 
State  of  North  Carolina  was  the  victim  of  a  carpet-bag 
government,  which  was  as  atrocious  as  any  that  afflict 
ed  any  other  Southern  State.  When  her  own  people 
got  possession  of  their  government,  her  Legislature  ap 
pointed  a  commission  of  eminent  lawyers,  to  investi 
gate  the  villainy  and  rascality  of  which  the  State  had 
been  made  a  victim  during  the  time  of  carpet-bag 
rule.  This  commission  took  a  great  mass  of  testi 
mony,  and  it  has  been  published  as  the  "  Eeport  of 
the  Fraud  Commission."  It  is  Document  No.  31,  of 
Session  1871-72.  And,  oh  !  it  does  disclose  a  period 
of  rascality,  knavery,  theft,  and  plunder,  which  makes 
the  reader  rage  and  gnash  his  teeth.  An  account  cf 
one  little  transaction  which  it  unearths  will  be  found  in 
teresting. 

Geo.  W.   Swepson  and  certain  accomplices,  of  whom 


27 

one  M.  S.  Littlefield,  of  New  York  State,  calling  him 
self  "  General,"  was  the  chief,  determined  to  go  into 
partnership  with  the  State  of  North  Carolina,  in  the 
business  of  building  railroads,  from  the  French  Broad 
River  to  the  Tennessee  line,  at  Ducktown  and  Paint 
Rock.  An  act  was  accordingly  passed  by  the  carpet 
bag  negro  Legislature  of  North  Carolina,  chartering 
the  Western  North  Carolina  Railroad,  as  it  was  to 
be  called,  and  providing  that  the  State  should  sub 
scribe  to  two  thirds  of  its  stock,  when  certificate  was 
made  to  the  Board  of  Internal  Improvement,  that  one 
third  of  what  it  would  cost  had  been  subscribed  by 
solvent  individuals,  and  the  building  of  the  road  had 
been  put  under  contract.  The  State's  subscription 
was  to  be  paid  for  in  her  bonds,  which  were  to  be  de 
livered  to  the  president  of  the  company.  In  October, 
1868,  those  who  proposed  to  organize  the  company 
had  a  meeting  at  Morganton.  $308,000  was,  at  that 
meeting,  subscribed  to  the  stock,  and  it  was  resolved 
that  the  subscribers  should  pay  up  in  cash  five  per 
cent  of  their  subscriptions.  $200,000  of  this  $308,000 
was  subscribed  for  by  "  General"  M.  S.  Littlefield, 
$100,000  by  one  Reynolds,  of  Statesville,  and  $8,000 
by  other  parties.  Littlefield  gave  his  check  on  a  Bal 
timore  banking  house,  for  $10,000,  for  his  five  per 
cent,  which  check  was  never  paid  ;  and  Reynolds 
gave  his  note  for  $5,000,  for  his  five  per  cent,  which, 
likewise,  never  was  paid.  Five  per  cent  in  money  was 
paid  on  the  $8,000.  Thus,  this  great  enterprise  was 
started  on  a  cash  capital  of  four  hundred  dollars. 


28 

George  W.  Swepson  was  made  president    of   the  com 
pany. 

Shortly  afterwards  subscriptions  were  added,  mak 
ing  the  whole  amount  $2,000,000.  Of  this  additional 
subscription  Colonel  S.  McD.  Tate  took  $500,000, 
and  General  E.  M.  Henry  took  $400,000,  and  General 
M.  S.  Littlefield  took  the  balance.  Nothing  was  ever 
paid  on  their  subscriptions.  The  subscriptions  neces 
sary  to  secure  $4,000,000  of  the  State's  bonds  were  thus 
secured,  save  only  that  the  requirement  of  the  statute 
that  they  should  be  made  by  solvent  individuals,  was 
hardly  complied  with.  It  was  necessary,  however, 
tinder  the  law,  to  go  one  step  further.  The  road  must 
actually  have  been  put  under  contract  before  the 
State  could  be  called  upon  to  issue  her  bonds.  But 
with  gentlemen  as  accommodating  as  General  Little- 
field  around,  this,  of  course,  would  not  long  remain  a 
difficulty.  It  is  true  that  legislative  lobbying  had 
theretofore  seemed  to  be  his/or/e,  and  he  had  not  been 
known  to  have  had  much  experience  in  building  rail 
roads,  but  he  was  not  the  man  to  allow  a  trifle  of  this 
sort  to  stand  between  a  friend  and  good  luck.  So  he 
took  a  contract  to  build  the  road  from  Asheville  west, 
while  Colonel  S.  McD.  Tate  took  one  to  build  it  from 
Asheville  to  Paint  Rock.  Thus  Mr.  Swepson  was  en 
abled  to  certify  to  the  Board  of  Internal  Improvement 
that  $2,000,000  of  the  capital  stock  had  been  sub 
scribed  for  by  SOLVENT  individuals,  and  that  the 
building  of  the  road  was  under  contract.  He  accord 
ingly  made  these  certificates,  whereupon  $4,000,000  of 


29 

the  bonds  of  the  State  of  North  Carolina  were  issued 
to  him,  in  payment  of  her  subscription  to  the  road. 
It  is  refreshing  to  consider  the  view  which  Swepson 
took  of  the  transaction  at  the  time  he  made  the  certifi 
cates.  The  following  question  was  asked  him  by  the 
commission  : 

"  Q.  Were  not  those  contracts  considered  at  the  time  a  mere 
formal  compliance  with  the  charter  to  procure  the  issuing  of  the 
bonds,  and  without  any  expectation  that  either  of  the  parties  would 
comply  with  the  terms  by  doing  the  work  ? 

"A.  It  was  considered  a  mere  formal  compliance,  in  order  to 
get  possession  of  the  bonds.  There  was  no  expectation  that  either 
of  the  parties  would  do  the  work  themselves,  or  any  part  of  it,  and 
that  the  road  would  be  let  to  real  contractors." 

Within  a  short  time  82,640,000  more  of  North  Caro 
lina's  bonds  were  issued  to  him  on  the  same  account. 
None  of  them  were  able  to  give  any  intelligible 
account  of  how  this  $2,640,000  came  to  be  issued  to 
him,  though  Mr.  Swepson  stated,  page  213  : 

"  In  regard  to  having  the  second  instalment  of  bonds  (after  the 
$4,000,000),  I  think  there  was  an  additional  subsciiption  made  by 
Litllefield,  but  the  five  per  cent  was  not  paid  by  him.  My  im 
pression  is,  that  I  must  have  made  the  certificate  to  the  Governor, 
otherwise  I  do  not  see  how  1  could  have  gotten  the  bonds.  But  I 
cannot  say  whether  I  did  or  did  not  make  the  certificate  ;  but  I 
got  the  bonds." 

Thus  under  a  scheme  by  which  the  State  was  to 
subscribe  to  two  thirds  of  the  stock  when  the  other 
third  was  subscribed  for  by  solvent  individuals,  and 
the  building  of  the  road  was  put  under  contract  to 
responsible  parties,  Swepson  was  put  into  possession 
of  $6,367,000  of  the  State's  bonds,  when  there  had 


30 

been  only  a  sham  subscription  to  $2,210,000  of  the 
stock,  and  the  building  of  the  road  had  been  put 
under  sham  contracts  to  these  sham  subscribers. 

Swepson  remained  president  of  the  company  until 
October,  1869.  In  that  time  he  had  disposed,  either 
by  sale  or  hypothecation,  of  $5,089,000  of  these  bonds, 
leaving  $1,278,000  of  them  in  his  possession,  accounted 
for  by  him  as  lost  through  various  accidents  and 
misfortunes  (page  320).  How  much  of  the  proceeds  of 
these  $5,089,000  of  bonds  the  railroad  got  the  benefit 
of,  I  do  nob  know  ;  but  Mr.  Swepson  has  given  us  an 
interesting  account  of  what  he  did  with  $880,000  of 
the  proceeds  of  them.  In  his  testimony  he  has  told 
us,  at  page  328  (compare  page  221),  that,  thinking  he 
saw  a  good  thing  down  in  Florida,  he  took  $160,000  of 
the  proceeds,  and  bought  a  majority  of  the  capital 
stock  of  the  Florida  Central  Railroad,  and  $720,000  of 
it  and  bought  $1,000,000  of  the  bonds  of  the  Pensacola 
and  Georgia  Railroad.  In  answer  to  the  commis 
sion's  questions,  regarding  this  transaction,  he  stated, 
page  209  : 

"  When  I  commenced  to  make  these  investments,  I  intended 
them  on  my  own  account  ;  but  after  the  heavy  losses  I  sustained 
in  New  York  and  other  places,  I  turned  them  over  to  Littlcfield,  to 
secure  the  Western  llailroad  Company,  he  agreeing;  to  pay  the  full 
amount  of  the  Florida  investment  to  that  company," 

After  Swepson  had  been  president  for  one  year,  it 
was  determined  to  turn  him  out  and  make  Littlefield 
president.  I  suppose  that  such  a  carcass  offered  pick 
ings  that  were  too  good  for  any  one  man  to  be  allowed 


31 

to  remain  long  in  possession  of  it ;  and  the  State  hold 
ing  a  majority  of  the  stock,  whoever  could  control  the 
State's  vote  could  be  made  president.  Svvepson  gave 
the  commission  the  following  account  of  that,  p.  217  : 

"  In  New  York,  just  before  the  election  of  president  of  the  com 
pany,  in  1809,  Mr.  Roberts,  the  secretary  of  the  company,  and  Mr. 
Dowell,  of  Asheville.were  caucusing  frequently  with  General  Little- 
field.  Littlefield  came  to  me  and  stated  that  it  was  determined  that 
he  should  be  elected  president  of  the  company  at  the  next  October 
meeting.  1  told  him  '  Very  well,'  but  that  they  must  settle  with 
me  ;  that  a  good  many  of  the  bonds  were  pledged  as  margins  fur 
various  persons,  and  1  had  lost  some  of  them  ;  that  they  must  take 
these  bonds  and  assume  the  margins  ;  that  they  must  take  my  in 
vestments  in  Florida,  and  if  they  would  settle  up,  and  let  me  out 
with  whole  bones,  1  would  settle  with  the  road  in  everything,  and 
willingly  stand  aside  and  say  nothing.  Littlefield  agreed  to  do  so. 
We  both  attended  the  meeting  at  Asheville,  where  1  declined  to  be 
a  candidate  for  the  presidency.  A  caucus  of  the  Republican  mem 
bers  of  the  corporation  was  had,  1  understood,  at  which  I  was  not 
present ;  but  General  Littlefield  told  me  it  was  determined  to  have 
a  Republican  president  of  the  road,  and  that  he  was  to  be  elected. 
*  *  *  The  meeting  of  stockholders  was  had,  and  General  Little- 
field  by  them  elected  president." 

So  that,  as  the  Florida  investment  of  the  road's 
money  turned  out  badly,  it  was  determined  that  the 
road  might  have  it. 

It  may  be  imagined  that  authority  for  all  this  stu 
pendous  and  infamous  robbery  was  not  obtained  with 
out  paying  for  it,  and  this  brings  us  to  the  most 
delicious  morccau  of  the  whole  evidence.  We  will 
preface  this  by  the  statement  that  all  the  world  now 
knows  that  "The  Fool,"  the  author  of  "A  Fool's 
Errand,"  who  has  professed  to  write  an  account  of  his 


32 

experiences  in  the  South,  is  A.  W.  Tourgce,  a  carpet 
bagger,  who  migrated  to  North  Carolina  directly  after 
the  war,  and  who  held  office  in  North  Carolina  under 
her  carpet-bagger  government  as  judge  of  one  of  her  cir 
cuits.  Mr.  Swepson  told  the  commission,  pp.  201  to  203: 

"  In  the  special  session  of  1868  a  bill  was  passed  making  an  ap 
propriation  to  the  western  division  of  the  Western  X.  C.  Railroad, 
as  I  now  remember.  That  bill  did  not  accomplish  the  purpose  ; 
for  the  reason,  as  I  understand,  that  no  tax  was  levied  to  pay  the 
interest.  In  the  fall  of  that  year  I  was  elected  president  of  said 
road.  1  came  to  Raleigh,  and  urged  the  passage  of  another  bill 
through  the  Legislature.  I  was  then  told  by  Littlefield  and  De- 
weese,  who  weie  a  kind  of  lobby  lawyers,  Littlefield  being  the 
principal,  that  I  would  get  no  bills  through  the  Legislature  unless  I 
entered  into  the  same  arrangement,  which  they  said  the  other  rail 
road  presidents  had  made,  to  pay  a  certain  per  cent  (ten  per  cent 
in  kind)  of  the  amount  of  the  appropriations."  (Let  it  be  recol 
lected  that  Littlefield  had  already  made  his  gieat  subscriptions  to 
the  stock  of  the  road,  and  had  already  taken  his  great  contract  to 
build  it.)  "  1  understood  frcm  Liltlcfield  and  Deweese  that  all 
the  other  railroad  presidents  had  made  such  an  arrangement  with 
them.  I  had  no  conversation  or  agreement  with  the  railroad  pres 
idents  myself  ;  but  it  was  generally  understood  that  each  of  them 
had  employed  Liltlefield  as  a  lobby  lawyer.  I  then  agreed  to  their 
proposition,  and  afterward  paid  Littlefield  upward  of  $240,000  in 
money  and  some  bonds  for  his  services  in  procuring  the  passage  of 
the  bills  through  the  Legislature,  making  appropriations  to  the 
western  division  of  said  road. 

"  Q.  How  did  you  make  those  payments  to  Littlefield,  of  money 
and  bonds  ? 

"A.  I  paid  money  in  various  ways.  Sometimes  upon  Little-field's 
order  ;  sometimes  by  taking  up  his  notes  and  notes  of  other  parties 
at  his  request  ;  sometimes  in  money  to  him  ;  some  bonds. 

"  Q.  Will  you  give  the  names  of  the  individuals  to  whom  these 
several  sums  of  money  have  been  paid  ? 


33 

"  A.  1  have  a  list  of  the  various  sums  of  money  paid  out,  the 
time  when  paid,  and  the  names  of  the  persons  to  whom  paid,  which 
list  I  will  furnish  hereafter  as  a  part  of  my  testimony.  1  have  it 

not  now  with  me. 

****•#*## 

"  Q.  You  stated  in  the  former  part  of  your  examination  that  you 
would  furnish  a  list  of  the  names  of  persons  to  whom  money  and 
bonds  were  paid.  Are  you  prepared  to  give  that  list  ? 

"  A.  Since  my  last  examination,  I  have  had  a  full  examination 
made  by  my  clerk  and  bookkeeper,  Mr  Rosenthal,  of  the  accounts 
kept  by  him,  and  I  hereby  furnish  to  the  committee  a  copy  from 
the  books  of  the  account  entitled  '  M.  S.  Littlefield  with  G.  W. 
Swepson.'  This  account  I  believe  to  be  correct.  The  same  was 
kept  by  my  bookkeeper  and  clerk,  Mr.  Rosenthal.  This  list  em 
braces  the  amount  of  $241,713.31,  which  I  stated  in  my  report 
made  to  N.  W.  Woodfin  and  other  commissioners,  had  been  ex 
pended  to  secure  the  charter  and  appropriations  on  account  of  the 
western  division  of  the  W.  N.  0.  R.  R.  Co. 

"  Q.  Will  you  please  state  particularly  on  what  account  thesn 
various  sums  of  money  were  paid,  and  whether  you  have  voucher* 
for  the  same  ? 

"A.  As  I  stated  in  my  previous  examination,  I  was  told  by 
General  Littlefield  and  Deweese  that  I  cou'd  get  no  bills  through 
the  Legislature  unless  I  entered  into  the  same  arrangements  agreed 
upon  by  the  other  railroad  presidents,  which  he  said  was  to  pay  ten 
per  cent  in  kind  on  the  amount  of  the  appropriations.  In  pursu 
ance  of  this  agreement  made  with  Littlefield,  who  was  the  princi 
pal  man  in  the  negotiation,  the  various  sums  of  money  were  paid 
out  to  the  different  persons  named  in  the  lists  furnished  upon  orders 
given  by  Littlefield,  or  upon  notes  given  by  him." 

The  account  which  Mr.  Swepson  furnished  of  the 
items  of  this  $241,713.31,  paid  for  getting  his  bills 
through  the  Legislature,  is  found  at  page  316  of  the  re 
port.  The  first  item  on  the- account  is  : 

"  June  17,  18G8.     To  A.  W,  Tourgee,  $200." 


34 

Near   the   end   of   the  account  the  following  item  ap 
pears  : 

"  July  24,  1869.     To  A.  W.  Tourgee  and  protest,  $3,502.55." 

Explaining  the  items  of  this  account,  Mr.  Swepson 
told  the  commission,  p.  203  : 

"  In  regard  to  the  item  of  $3,500,  charged  to  have  been  paid  to 
A.  W.  Tonrgee,  my  recollection  is  that  this  was  a  draft  of  A.  W. 
Tourgee,  drawn  on  me  without  authority,  and  I  did  not  pay  it  un 
til  some  time  after  it  had  gone  to  protest,  when  General  Littlefield 
requested  me  to  pay  it,  and  charge  it  to  him  on  this  account.  I 
did  so." 

Again,  page  218,  the  commission  returned  to  this  ac 
count  and  asked  the  following  question  : 

"  Q.  Look  over  the  account  furnished  by  you  as  charged  against 
Littlefield,  and  explain  the  items  as  well  as  you  can  recollect,  and 
the  considerations  therefor. 

"  A.  All  these  items  were  paid,  as  I  have  before  stated,  under  an 
agreement  between  me  and  Littlefield.  As  to  item  charged  to  A. 
W.  Tourgee,  June  17,  1868,  of  $200,  the  account  given  by  Mr. 
Roscnthal  is  correct." 

We  go  now  to  Rosenthal's  testimony,  p.  225.  After 
stating  that  he  was  clerk  and  bookkeeper  for  Swep 
son  from  18G5  to  the  fall  of  1870,  and  that  he  had 
made  out  the  account  which  Swepson  had  filed,  and 
that  it  correctly  represented  the  money  that  Swepson 
had  paid  on  account  of  his  bargain  with  Littlefield,  he 
was  asked  : 

"  Q.  Do  you  know  the  consideration  for  which  these  various 
sums  of  money  were  paid  ? 

"A.  As  to  the  first  item  charged  against  A.  W.   Tourgee,  of 


35 

$200,  my  impression  is  that  it  was  a  note  that  was  in  bank  which 
was  overdue,  and  Swepson  took  it  up.  It  is  probable,  however, 
that  it  is  for  money  loaned  directly  by  Swepson  to  Tourgee.  I  was 
told  to  charge  it  to  Littlefield.  1  was  told  by  Mr.  Swepson  that  he 
was  to  pay  Littlefield  a  certain  sum  for  getting  these  railroad  bills 
through  the  Legislature,  and  these  payments  were  to  be  charged 
against  that  account.  As  to  the  second  item  of  $3,502.55  against 
Tourgee,  of  date  July  24,  1869,  a  draft  drawn  by  Tourgee  on  G. 
W.  Swepson  for  $3,500  was  presented  for  payment,  and  payment 
refused,  and  it  went  to  protest.  Some  time  afterwards  Mr.  Swep 
son  instructed  me  to  pay  it,  and  charge  it  to  this  account,  which 
Idid." 

The  commission  state,  at  page  21,  that  they  had 
summoned  all  persons  referred  to  in  Swepson's  account 
before  them  to  be  examined  with  reference  to  the  pay 
ments  there  charged,  and  that  all  had  come  except 
James  Sinclair  and  Judge  Tourgee.* 

"  General"  Byron  Laflin,  a  "  visiting  statesman," 
who  did  North  Carolina  the  honor  to  represent  one  of 
her  counties  in  her  Legislature,  and  who  figures  in 
several  places  in  the  report  (Mr.  Swepson  accounts  for 
$55,000  of  the  $1,278,000  that  he  was  short  by  this 
item,  "  55  bonds  hypothecated  with  Clews  &  Co.,  on  ac 
count  of  Byron  Laflin"),  got  into  an  omnibus  one  day 
to  go  to  the  railroad  depot  on  his  way  North,  about 
the  time  that  the  carpet-bagger  government  was  fall 
ing  to  pieces  ;  some  one  called  to  him,  "  Why,  General, 
are  you  not  coming  back?"  "  Oh,"  said  he  in  reply, 
"is  there  anything  left?"  Little  matters  of  this  sort  ; 
are  quite  sufficient  to  account  for  the  people  of  North 


*  See  Addendum,  page  87. 


36 

Carolina  having  made  Mr.  Tourgee's  stay  there  quite 
disagreeable  to  him,  without  resorting  to  the  presump 
tion  that  he  was  unpopular  hy  reason  of  being  a 
Northern  man.  I  have  no  doubt  that  if  "  General" 
Laflin  should  come  forward  to  testify  in  the  matter  he 
would  tell  us  that  his  stay  was  made  quite  as  uncomfort 
able  as  Mr.  Tourgee's. 

But  one  result  could  flow  from  this  state  of  things. 
Those  who  looked  for  peace  and  order  under  it  expect 
ed  the  laws  of  nature  to  reverse  themselves.  They 
were  people  who  could  persuade  themselves  to  believe 
that  water  could  be  coaxed  into  running  up  hill,  or 
that  Niagara's  torrent  might  be  checked  with  a  finger. 
Just  so  long  as  the  negroes  remained  banded  into  a 
solid  organization — held  together  for  the  sole  and  ex 
clusive  purpose  of  dominating  the  whites,  and  just  so 
long  as  the  carpet-baggers  remained  amongst  the 
people  egging  the  negroes  on,  and  encouraging  them 
to  maintain  their  organizations — just  so  long  there  was 
bound  to  be  hostility  between  the  races  and  bitter  and 
undying  hatred  of  the  carpet-baggers.  Be  the  com 
munity  where  it  may,  the  virtue,  the  intelligence,  and 
the  property  of  that  community  must  rule  it,  and 
when  the  community  is  divided  into  two  distinctly 
marked  races,  and  one  of  them  contains  all  the  virtue, 
intelligence,  and  property,  and  the  other  has  none  of 
either,  then  the  more  civilized  race  must  dominate  the 
less  civilized,  whether  it  be  more  numerous  or  whether 
it  be  less  numerous.  If  it  is  not  done  by  direct  force, 
it  will  be  done  by  superior  knowledge  and  art.  It 


37 

must  bo  so  as  between  the  Southern  negro  and  white  ; 
it  would  be  so  as  between  the  Northener  and  the 
Chinaman  ;  it  must  happen  between  the  Englishman 
and  the  Zulu. 

If  the  people  of  the  North  and  West  would  only 
learn  the  lesson  which  reflection  and  experience  long 
to  teach,  they  would  abandon  the  attempt  to  force  an 
intercommunion  of  the  races  in  the  South,  which  the 
laws  of  nature  forbid.  They  would  learn  that  race 
prejudice  is  the  most  powerful  force  that  operates  upon 
the  human  mind,  and  that  all  the  bayonets  on  earth 
cannot  force  a  race,  holding  the  relation  to  another  race 
that  the  white  people  of  the  South  hold  to  the  negroes, 
to  live  in  submission  to  that  less  civilized  race.  Risk 
of  death  is  more  endurable  to  them,  and  a  persistent 
effort  to  force  the  submission  must  result  in  constant 
revolution  and  bloodshed. 

The  people  of  the  North  and  West  are  greatly  mis 
taken,  too,  in  their  idea  of  the  relations  that  exist  in 
the  South  between  the  two  races.  There  is  no  hostility 
whatever  between  them  when  the  negroes  are  let 
alone,  and  no  designing  scoundrels  stir  up  strife  be 
tween  them  for  the  accomplishment  of  their  own  ends. 
The  attempt  to  maintain  carpet-bag  governments  in  the 
South  having  been  abandoned  for  several  years  past,  the 
utmost  cordiality  and  amity  have  come  to  exist  between 
the  two  races.  The  two  races  having  been  born  and 
reared  together,  each  understands  perfectly  his  position 
in  the  social  scale,  and  neither  attempts  to  invade 
the  domain  of  the  other.  The  negro  is  pressing  himself 


38 

along,  acquiring  property  and  educating  his  children. 
With  nothing  to  excite  the  white  man's  prejudice  of 
race,  this  is  telling  on  him.  He  is  beginning  to  watch 
with  great  interest  the  negro's  development  from  a 
condition  of  servitude  into  one  that  will  in  time  fit  him 
for  the  discharge  of  a  citizen's  duties.  He  aids  and 
encourages  him  in  every  way  in  his  power.  He  gives 
him  absolute  protection  in  all  his  rights  of  person  and 
property.  In  the  courts  the  negro  receives  as  absolute 
justice  when  his  controversy  is  with  a  white  man,  as  the 
white  man  would  receive  in  a  controversy  with  another 
white  man.  The  white  man  all  over  the  South  is  tax 
ing  himself,  and  heavily  too,  to  furnish  free  school 
education  to  the  negro,  and  it  is  telling  wonderfully 
upon  that  race.  A  few  of  the  facts  relating  to  this 
matter  in  the  State  of  Virginia  will  be  interesting  in 
this  connection.  The  white  people  of  Virginia  over 
threw  the  carpet-baggers  and  got  possession  of  their 
government  in  18G9.  From  that  time  to  this  they  have 
annually  taxed  themselves  to  keep  up  an  elaborate  free 
school  system,  and  the  following  numbers  of  negro 
children  have  been  annually  taught  in  the  free  schools  : 

In  1871,  there  were  38,554  ;  in  1872,  46,736  ;  in  1873, 
47,506  ;  in  1874,  52,086  ;  in  1875,  54,041  ;  in  1876,  62,- 
178  ;  in  1877,  65,043  ;  in  1878,  61,772  ;  in  1870,  35,768  ; 
in  1880,  68,000. 

Here  are  more  than  half  a  million  of  negro  children 
that  the  white  people  of  the  State  of  Virginia  have 
given  the  advantages  of  education  to  in  the  past  ten 
years.  The  negroes  themselves  have  contributed  little 


39 

or  nothing  toward  the  cost  of  it.  The  expense  of  it 
has  been  voluntarily  borne  by  the  white  people  of  the 
State,  and  that  notwithstanding  the  utter  disorgani 
zation  of  labor  left  by  the  war,  the  loss  of  capital  and 
the  destruction  of  property,  and  the  terrible  pressure  of 
a  very  large  public  debt,  created  before  the  war.  The 
difference  of  conditions  being  considered,  the  other 
Southern  States  show  a  parallel  state  of  affairs.  The 
white  people  of  Virginia  have  shown  the  same  humane 
spirit  in  their  care  for  the  negro  insane.  A  central 
lunatic  hospital  has  been  established  for  them,  in 
which  all  the  insane  negroes  of  the  State  are  placed, 
and  they  there  receive  the  very  same  attention  and 
care  that  are  bestowed  upon  the  white  insane.  Every 
medical  appliance  which  the  progress  of  civilization 
shows  to  be  adapted  to  the  treatment  of  the  insane,  is 
furnished  to  these  negroes.  For  the  past  ten  years 
there  have  been  in  this  hospital  an  average  of  nearly 
three  hundred  patients  each  year.  The  very  great 
expense  of  this  is  voluntarily  borne  by  the  white  people 
of  Virginia. 

As  illustrative  of  the  utter  absence  of  hostile  feelings 
between  the  races  when  they  are  allowed  to  dwell 
together  without  the  disturbing  influence  of  selfish 
carpet-baggers,  I  venture  to  make  this  statement. 
The  proprietors  of  a  street  -  car  line  in  Richmond, 
Charleston,  Savannah,  Mobile,  or  New  Orleans,  might 
on  any  day  discharge  every  white  driver  and  fill  their 
places  with  negroes,  and  no  greater  commotion  would 
ensue  than  upon  any  other  ordinary  change  in  a  busi 
ness. 


40 

I  should  not  like  to  see  the  result  if  such  an  experi 
ment  should  be  tried  in  the  City  of  New  York  or  in 
Boston  ! 

When  the  Virginia  delegation  to  the  Democratic 
Convention  at  Cincinnati  went  out,  one  gentleman,  a 
delegate  from  the  city  of  Richmond,  carried  his  servant, 
a  negro  man,  with  him.  On  the  way  to  Cincinnati  it 
became  necessary  to  travel  all  night  on  the  Pennsylva 
nia  Railroad.  The  gentleman  mentioned,  determining 
that  his  servant  should  be  comfortable,  hired  a  sleep 
ing  berth  for  him.  Mr.  Samuel  J.  Randall,  Speaker  of 
the  House  of  Representatives,  and  a  prominent  candi 
date  for  the  Presidency — so  prominent  that  the  great 
State  of  New  York  cast  her  entire  seventy  votes  for 
him — was  on  the  train,  and  it  was  so  crowded  that  he 
could  not  get  a  sleeping  berth.  The  conductor  of  the 
train  came  to  this  Virginia  delegate  and  asked  him  if 
he  would  not  make  his  servant  surrender  his  berth  to 
Mr.  Randall  ;  that  if  he  did  not,  Mr.  Randall  would 
have  to  sit  up  all  night.  The  delegate  very  promptly 
told  him  that  he  would  not  ;  that  it  was  a  mere  ques 
tion  of  whether  Mr.  Randall  should  be  uncomfortable 
all  night  or  whether  his  servant  should  be  uncomfort 
able,  and  that  Mr.  Randall  had  as  well  be  uncomfort 
able  as  his  servant.  And  he  went  to  the  negro  and 
told  him  to  let  him  know  if  any  effort  was  made  to 
deprive  him  of  his  berth,  and  that  he  would  protect 
him.  Every  Virginia  delegate  to  the  convention  can 
vouch  for  the  truth  of  this  statement. 

Now,  this  delegate  was  in  every  way  identified  in  the 


41 

most  intimate  manner  with  that  element  in  the  South 
ern  States  which  "  The  Fool"  represents  as  hating  the 
negro  with  an  intense  hatred,  and  yet  he  would  not  con 
sent  to  see  his  negro  servant  made  uncomfortable 
to  make  the  present  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Repre 
sentatives,  and  possible  future  President,  comfortable. 
I  would  like  to  see  which  one  of  "  The  Fools"  who 
vex  the  ear  of  the  public  with  their  snivelling  lies 
about  the  oppression  of  the  negro,  would  have  done 
this  !  Whichever  one  of  them  had  been  applied  to,  he 
would  have  hastened,  with  obsequious  self-abasement, 
to  kick  his  servant  out,  that  the  great  man  might 
enjoy  his  ease. 

It  is  only  necessary  to  leave  the  white  man  and  the 
negro  alone,  and  they  dwell  together  in  perfect  peace, 
and  the  negro  will,  by  degrees,  evolve  himself  into 
such  a  condition  of  civilization  as  to  entitle  himself  to 
a  share  in  the  political  administration  of  the  country. 
But  if  this  constant  effort  to  force  an  unnatural  as 
similation  of  the  races  is  kept  up,  disorder  and  confu 
sion  must  be  the  result.  When  a  small  auger-hole  is 
bored  through  the  bottom  of  a  tank  full  of  water,  if  let 
alone,  it  will,  by  degrees,  draw  all  the  water  off  and 
leave  the  tank  in  perfect  condition.  But  if  an  attempt 
be  made  to  force  the  water  through  this  small  orifice, 
so  that  the  tank  may  be  emptied  in  half  the  time,  it  will 
burst,  and  great  damage  will  be  done. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

TREATMENT  OF  NORTHERNERS  IN  THE  SOUTH. 

"  THE  FOOL"  represents  the  Southern  people  to 
have  been  animated  with  a  bitter  hatred  towards  all 
people  from  the  North.  This  also  is  a  slander  upon 
them,  and  can  easily  be  shown  to  be  one.  They  did 
and  do  have  the  most  intense  feeling  of  hostility  for 
all  Northerners  who,  like  "  The  Fool,"  came  amongst 
them  to  band  the  negroes  together  as  a  political  ma 
chine,  through  which  they  might  be  plundered  and 
robbed.  But  every  Northerner  who  has  gone  into  the 
South  since  the  war,  settled  amongst  the  people,  and 
shown  an  intention  to  accept  the  situation  as  it  is,  and 
to  try  and  build  up  the  country  and  retrieve  the  losses 
of  the  war,  has  been  received  by  the  people  with  re 
spect  and  hospitality,  without  any  regard  whatever  to 
the  place  from  whence  he  came. 

Gilbert  C.  Walker,  of  the  State  of  New  York,  came 
to  Virginia  in  the  year  18G5,  connected  with  the  Fed 
eral  army,  and  settled  at  Norfolk,  Va.  As  soon  as  the 
war  was  over,  he  accepted  it  as  ended,  and  showed  by 
all  he  did  and  said  that  he  proposed  to  live  in  peace  and 
amity  with  the  people  amongst  whom  he  had  settled. 
He  soon  became  exceedingly  popular.  In  1801),  when 
the  white  people  of  Virginia  were  given  an  opportu 
nity  to  struggle  for  the  possession  of  their  govern 
ment,  they  selected  Gilbert  C.  Walker  —  Northerner 
though  he  was,  connected  with  the  Federal  army 


43 

though  lie  had  been — and  made  him  their  candidate 
for  Governor,  against  H.  H.  Wells,  a  Northerner  of  the 
carpet-bagger  stripe,  whom  the  negroes  made  theirs. 

Walker  was  elected  Governor.  He  served  his  term 
of  four  years  with  great  satisfaction  to  all  orders  of 
the  people,  and  when  he  came  out  of  his  office  he  was 
the  most  popular  man  before  the  white  people  of  Vir 
ginia  in  the  State.  He  could  have  beaten  any  other 
man  in  the  State,  upon  a  direct  vote  of  the  white 
people,  for  any  office  within  their  gift.  I  have,  my 
self,  seen  him  come  into  the  Richmond  Theatre,  when 
it  was  filled  from  pit  to  dome  with  all  classes  of  peo 
ple,  from  the  humblest  artisan  to  the  proudest  scion 
of  the  old  slave-holding  aristocracy,  and  I  have  seen 
the  entire  body,  ladies  and  gentlemen,  rise  as  one  man 
to  cheer  him. 

As  soon  as  his  term  of  Governor  was  ended,  he 
offered  himself  as  a  candidate  for  nomination,  by  the 
white  people,  for  member  of  the  House  of  Represent 
atives  from  the  metropolitan  district  of  Virginia, 
containing  the  city  of  Richmond,  the  capital  of  the 
late  Confederacy.  His  competitor  for  the  nomina 
tion  was  Col.  John  H.  Gay,  a  gentleman  of  the 
highest  integrity  and  character — universally  respected 
and  esteemed — a  man  who  had  been  a  distinguished 
colonel  in  the  Confederate  army,  and  who  was  in  every 
way  identified  with  the  old  slave-holding  element.  Yet 
Walker  beat  Col.  Guy,  before  the  WHITE  PEOPLE,  ten  votes 
to  one.  He  was  elected  to  Congress,  served  his  term 
of  two  years,  returned,  and  offered  again  for  the  white 


44 

people's  nomination.  This  time  no  one  dared  to  run 
against  him,  and  he  was  made  the  white  man's  candi 
date,  nem.  con. 

Colonel  Albert  Ordway,  of  Massachusetts,  came  into 
Richmond  at  the  surrender,  in  command  of  a  Massa 
chusetts  regiment.  He  settled  there,  and  at  once 
manifested  a  purpose  similar  to  Walker's.  He  gained 
unbounded  popularity,  was  constantly  sent  to  the  city 
council  by  the  white  people — was  made  their  candidate 
for  Congress,  and  was  one  of  the  most  popular  mem 
bers  of  the  Richmond  Club,  a  social  institution,  which 
was  very  small  and  very  select,  and  composed  almost 
entirely  of  the  bluest  blood  of  the  old  slave-holding- 
aristocracy. 

General  W.  F.  Bartlett,  of  Massachusetts,  had  been 
a  distinguished  soldier  in  the  Federal  army.  He  had 
commanded  a  brigade  of  negroes  at  the  terrible  battle 
of  July  30,  18C4,  known  as  the  battle  of  "  The  Crater." 
In  1872  he  settled  in  the  city  of  Richmond.  Writing 
to  his  friends  in  Massachusetts,  he  says  :  "  Before  we 
had  been  here  a  month  we  found  ourselves  over 
whelmed  with  kindness,  cordiality,  and  hospitality 
from  the  very  nicest  people  here."  "  Palfrey's  Life  of 
Bartlett,"  page  235. 

These  facts  speak  for  themselves.  They  give  voice 
to  louder  tones  than  all  the  brays  of  all  the  fools  that 
ever  went  on  errands  of  plunder  and  theft.  And  in 
stance  might  be  piled  upon  instance,  taken  from  each 
Southern  State,  indicating  the  cordial  reception  which 
the  people  have  ever  given  to  all  Northerners  who 


45 

have  come  to  settle  among  them  for  the  purpose  of 
building  up  the  country.  They  have  had  no  feelings 
of  hostility  for  any  Northerners  except  those  who 
have  come  amongst  them  to  plunder  and  rob,  and  to 
band  the  negroes  together  as  a  political  machine  for 
their  own  subjection.  They  have,  and  in  the  nature  of 
things  must  have,  a  deep  and  abiding  hatred  for  those. 


CHAPTER    V. 

>F   THE    "  REBEI 

"  REBEL  BRIGADIER"  THE  MOST  LAW- ABIDING 
CITIZEN  IN  THE  COUNTRY  —  DUPLICITY  OF  THE 
REPUBLICAN  ADMINISTRATION  IN  VIRGINIA  POLI 
TICS. 

THERE  is  a  general  belief  in  the  minds  of  Northern 
people  that  the  white  people  of  the  South  are  a  law 
less,  turbulent,  disorderly  set,  quite  opposed  to  every 
thing  in  the  nature  of  conservatism.  The  "  Rebel 
Brigadier"  represents  to  the  Northern  mind  an  em 
bodiment  of  all  that  is  opposed  to  law  and  order. 
Now,  no  greater  injustice  was  ever  done  to  a  people 
than  this  error  does  to  the  Southern  people.  There  is 
no  people  now  living  upon  the  globe  who  are  so 
entirely  conservative  in  their  character  as  the  white 
people  of  the  Southern  States.  They  fought  the  late 
war  from  a  sense  of  duty,  and  with  a  deep-seated 
conviction  that  they  were  right.  However  much  a 


46 

Northern  man  may  declare  that  the  act  of  the  Southern 
man  was  treason,  yet  to  the  mind  of  the  Southern  man 
his  act  was  not  only  right  in  the  sight  of  God,  but  en 
joined  upon  him  by  His  law.  Having  failed  in  his 
contest  he  has  loyally  surrendered  the  propositions  for 
which  he  fought,  and  he  proposes  loyally  to  abide  by 
the  covenant  into  which  he  entered  at  the  end  of  the 
war.  He  will  not  tolerate  a  suggestion  of  anything 
which  is  not  in  perfect  faith  with  the  terms  upon 
which  the  surrender  of  his  arms  was  received.  Should 
a  Northern  State  attempt  to  secede  from  this  Union, 
no  part  of  the  country  could  be  relied  upon  so  surely 
to  coerce  her  to  resume  her  proper  relations  to  the 
General  Government  as  the  lately  seceded  States. 
The  State  of  Virginia  to-day  affords  a  striking  illustra 
tion  of  the  conservative  character  of  the  "  Rebel  Brig 
adier."  Before  the  late  war,  that  State  had  borrowed 
a  large  sum  of  money,  which  had  been  expended  in 
creating  her  railroads,  canals,  and  public  institutions, 
for  which  she  had  given  her  bonds.  Within  the  past 
five  years  an  effort,  headed  by  Wm.  Mahone,  who  was 
a  major-general  in  the  Confederate  army,  has  been  set 
on  foot  to  repudiate  a  large  part,  if  not  all,  of  this 
debt.  In  the  fall  of  1879  an  election  for  members  of 
the  Legislature  was  held  in  Virginia,  and  the  issue  in 
that  election  was  the  repudiation  or  non-repudiation  of 
the  debt.  In  that  election  all  the  negroes  (who  con 
stitute  the  Republican  party  of  the  State)  voted  for 
legislative  candidates  who  favored  repudiation,  while 
every  "  Rebel  Brigadier"  in  the  State.,  save  and  except 
Wm.  Mahone,  voted  to  make,  the  State  pay  her  debt. 


47 

There  exists  to-day,  in  every  county  in  Virginia,  a 
feeling  of  bitterness  between  the  repudiators  and  the 
debt-payers,  more  intense  than  any  that  ever  existed 
between  any  political  factions  in  the  United  [States. 
Duels  have  been  fought  over  it,  and  constant  personal 
collisions  have  occurred  and  are  occurring,  and  yet 
every  single  (i  Rebel  Brigadier"  who  now  resides  in  the 
State  of  Virginia,  except  Win.  Mahone,  is  on  the  side  of 
the  debt-payers. 

Here  they  are  by  name — every  person  now  living  in 
the  State  of  Virginia  who  held  rank  in  the  Confed 
erate  army  of  brigadier- general  and  above,  with  the  rank 
of  each  : 

1st,  General  :  General  Joseph  E.  Johnston. 

2d,  Lieutenant-General  :  General  Jubal  A.  Early. 

3d,  Major-Generals  :  General  Fitz  Lee,  General  W. 
II.  F.  Lee,  General  1).  II.  Maury,  General  Kobert  Ran 
som,  General  II.  Heth,  General  J.  L.  Kemper,  General 
James  A.  Walker,  General  L.  L.  Lomax,  General  Will 
iam  Smith,  General  G.  0.  Wharton,  General  Samuel 
Jones,  General  William  B.  Taliafero,  General  Custis 
Lee,  General  Thomas  L.  Rosser,  General  Charles 
Field. 

4th,  Brigadier- Generals  :  General  William  II.  Payne, 
General  Lindsay  Walker,  General  McComb,  General 
R.  D.  Lilly,  General  D.  A.  Weisiger,  General  John 
Echols,  General  R.  L.  T.  Beale,  General  Joseph  R. 
Anderson,  General  John  R.  Cooke,  General  Eppa 
Hunton,  General  J.  II.  Laixe,  General  M.  D.  Corse, 
General  Beverly  Robertson,  General  T.  T.  Munford, 


48 

General  William  R.  Terry,  General  William  Terry, 
General  T.  M.  Logan,  General  William  0.  Wickharn, 
General  P.  T.  Moore,  General  Seth  Barton. 

This  is  a  galaxy  of  citizens  of  which  any  State  that 
ever  existed  might  bo  proud.  No  nobler,  truer,  more 
self-sacrificing  men  ever  lived  in  any  country,  than 
those  whose  names  are  mentioned  above.  Show  them 
anything  that  it  is  their  duty  to  do,  and  they  will  do 
it,  let  the  consequences  be  what  they  may. 

In  the  election  just  held,  three  Presidential  electoral 
tickets  were  run  and  voted  for  in  the  State — two  Han 
cock  tickets  and  one  Garfield  ticket.  One  of  the  Han 
cock  tickets  was  put  in  nomination  by  a  convention  of 
the  "  Read j listers'  "  party.  All  the  negroes  voted  for 
the  Garfield  ticket,  and  all  the  whites,  save  a  percent 
age  too  small  to  be  of  consequence,  voted  for  one  or  the 
other  of  the  Hancock  tickets.  The  result  was,  for  the 
Debt-payers'  ticket,  9G,912  votes  ;  for  the  "  Readjusted  " 
ticket,  31,074  ;  for  the  Republican  ticket,  84,020.  Now 
I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  all  who  Toted  for  the  debt- 
payers'  ticket  are  debt-payers.  But  I  do  mean  to  say 
that  a  very  large  proportion  of  them,  perhaps  eight 
out  of  ten,  are.  It  is  easy  therefore  to  see  how  quickly 
the  matter  of  repudiation  would  be  disposed  of  in  Vir 
ginia  if  the  "  Rebel  Brigadiers"  and  the  white  people 
were  allowed  to  have  their  way,  and  the  Republican 
party  did  not  force  the  State  into  repudiation. 

In  the  contest  that  is  going  on  in  Virginia  over  this 
question  of  repudiation,  not  only  are  the  "  Rebel 
Brigadiers"  on  the  side  of  the  debt-payers,  but  almost 


49 

all  of  what  is  derided  as  the  "  rehel  element"  is  on 
the  same  side.  Indeed,  there  is  nothing  on  the  side  of 
the  debt-payers  save  and  except  that  which  is  denomi 
nated  in  the  North  as  the  "  rebel  element."  On  the 
side  of  repudiation  are  all  the  negroes,  i.e,  the  Re 
publican  party,  and  the  bummer  and  office-seeking 
element  of  the  whites.  The  debt-payers'  party  is 
made  up  of  those  who  constituted  the  controlling 
classes  before  the  war,  while  the  repudiators9  party  is 
made  up  almost  entirely  of  the  Republicans  in  the  State, 
i.e.,  the  negroes.  It  is  but  justice  to  say  that  of  the 
few  white  people  in  the  State  who  are  Republicans, 
some,  perhaps  a  majority,  are  debt-payers.  But  the 
fact  stands,  an  incontestable  fact,  that  the  State  of 
Virginia  is  before  the  world  this  day  as  a  repudiating 
State,  and  made  so  by  the  vote  of  the  Republican 
party,  and  in  the  face  of  the  fierce  and  indignant  pro 
test  of  the  "Rebel  Brigadiers."  Not  only  did  the 
rank  and  file  of  the  Republican  voters  vote  for  the  re- 
pudiators'  candidates  in  the  election  of  a  Legislature  in 
the  fall  of  1879,  but  those  Republican  candidates  who 
were  elected  to  the  Legislature,  with  but  few  exceptions, 
voted  for  the  measures  of  repudiation  that  were 
brought  before  that  body.  A  bill  was  brought  up  for  its 
consideration,  known  as  the  Riddleberger  bill,  which 
repudiated  nearly  one  half  of  the  debt  straight  out, 
and  provided  the  machinery  for  repudiating  all  the 
rest,  and  this  bill  could  not  have  passed  either  body 
of  the  Legislature  without  the  votes  of  the  Repub 
lican  members,  and  it  was  passed  through  both  bodies 


50 

l)y  their  votes.  It  is  not  a  statute  of  Virginia  to 
day,  solely  because  her  Governor,  a  gallant  "  rebel"  colo 
nel  who  had  lost  his  right  arm  in  battle  at  the  head  of 
his  regiment,  vetoed  it,  and  her  constitution  requiring  a 
vote  of  two  thirds  of  the  body  to  pass  it  over  his  veto, 
the  effort  made  by  the  Republican  members  to  accom 
plish  that  end  was  defeated  by  the  "  rebel  element"  of 
her  Legislature. 

Further,  with  all  the  clatter  that  the  Republican 
party  makes  about  its  being  the  party  of  law  and  order 
and  public  credit  in  this  country,  its  leaders  gave  all 
the  aid  and  encouragement  in  their  power  to  the  repu 
diation  party  in  Virginia  in  this  same  election.  The 
negroes  vote  absolutely  at  the  beck  and  call  of  the 
administration  of  the  Federal  Government.  In  the 
contest  in  Virginia,  in  the  fall  of  1879,  had  the  Federal 
administration  put  in  its  oar,  and  made  a  serious 
effort  to  control  the  negro  vote,  that  vote  would  have 
been  cast  solidly  for  the  debt-payers'  candidates.  But 
because  the  debt -payers'  party  was  composed  of  the 
respectable  part  of  the  white  people  of  the  State,  the 
influence  of  the  administration  was  all  thrown,  in  a 
silent  and  secret  way,  upon  the  side  of  the  repudia- 
tors,  whilst  great  pretence  was  publicly  made  that  the 
administration  was  on  the  side  of  the  debt-payers. 
One  fact  will  prove  this  statement  beyond  the  possi 
bility  of  cavil.  When  the  canvass  was  at  its  hottest, 
Mr.  Green  B.  Raum,  next  in  the  Treasury  Department 
to  the  Secretary,  made  public  proclamation  that,  as  an 
important  part  of  Mr.  Hayes'  administration,  ho  had 


51 

notified  one  Van  Aucken,  an  officer  of  internal  revenue 
at  Petersburg,  that  it  had  been  reported  to  the  Govern 
ment  that  he  favored  repudiation  ;  and  that  he  had 
notified  him  that  the  Government  would  not  tolerate 
any  such  views  in  one  of  its  officers,  and  that  he  must 
change  them  or  give  up  his  office.  He  added  some 
fine  homilies  upon  the  duty  of  paying  debts.  This 
action  of  the  administration  was  heralded  all  over  the 
United  States,  and  was  in  half  the  papers  published 
in  America.  Good  Republicans,  wherever  they  read  it, 
raised  their  eyes  to  heaven,  and  thanked  God  that 
their  President  was  not  as  other  men,  and  that  the 
rights  of  honest  creditors  were  safe  in  his  hands. 

Now  it  so  happened  that  Van  Aucken  was  an 
original  debt-payer,  had  been  one  all  along,  and  was 
one  of  the  fiercest  enemies  the  candidates  of  repudia 
tion  had  in  his  vicinity.  But  one  Hathaway  was  a 
collector  of  customs  at  Norfolk,  drawing  regularly  a 
salary  of  $1,800  per  annum.  This  man,  during  all  this 
time,  edited  a  daily  paper  at  Norfolk,  called  the  Day- 
Boole,  which  was  the  rankest  advocate  of  repudiation 
in  the  State.  Now,  though  the  attention  of  the  ad 
ministration  was  constantly  called  to  the  injury  which 
he  was  doing  the  debt-payers'  party  with  his  paper, 
he  was  never  once  molested,  and  was  allowed  to  draw 
his  salary  regularly  from  the  treasury  of  the  United 
States,  to  supply  him  with  means  with  which  he  could 
force  the  State  of  Virginia  to  repudiate  that  debt, 
which  her  "  rebel"  sons  were  trying  to  make  her  pay. 
The  credit  of  the  Republican  party  was  preserved, 


52 

while  no  harm  was  done  to  the  repudiators'  party. 
All  the  aid  in  the  administration's  power  was  thus 
secretly  given  to  the  party  of  repudiation  in  the  State. 

The  result  of  the  war  left  the  white  people  of 
Virginia  flat  on  their  backs.  Their  farms  were  devas 
tated,  denuded  of  stock  and  farming  implements ; 
fences  were  gone  ;  their  slaves,  the  real  productive 
property,  npon  the  faith  of  which  the  public  debt  had 
been  contracted,  were  taken  from  them  without  com 
pensation.  There  are  many  persons  who  would  not 
have  been  surprised  had  these  people  in  their  despair 
said  to  their  creditors  :  "  We  have  been  subjugated, 
we  have  been  conquered,  we  have  been  robbed  by  our 
conquerors  of  all  that  we  had  when  we  borrowed  your 
money.  We  refuse  to  be  made  the  victims  of  plunder, 
and  still  hold  ourselves  bound  to  pay.  Go,  seek  your 
money  at  the  hands  of  those  who  have  forcibly  taken 
from  us  our  means  of  payment."  At  least  it  would 
have  created  no  surprise  if,  seeing  the  newly  enfran 
chised  race  bent  on  repudiation,  they  had  stood  aside 
and  permitted  them  to  work  their  will.  They  have 
done  neither  of  these  things.  To  its  everlasting  glory 
be  it  said,  the  derided  "  rebel  element"  of  Virginia  has 
fought  and  fought,  and  is  still  fighting,  against  the 
Republican  party  of  Virginia  for  the  privilege  of  pay 
ing  to  their  creditors — citizens  of  the  Northern  States 
and  of  Great  Britain — what  their  State  owes  to  them. 
And  they  have  done  this,  notwithstanding  the  fact 
that  it  is  they  themselves  who  must  pay  it  all,  the 
Republican  voters  being  almost  all  non-property- 


53 

holders.  Surely  these  be  people  who  may  repel  the 
charge  of  turbulence  and  lawlessness  !  Surely  these 
be  people  who  may  claim  that  they  are  animated  by  the 
very  highest  sense  of  duty  and  conservatism. 

The  hydra  of  which  we  flippantly  speak  as  "  The 
Commune"  is  lifting  its  many  heads  in  every  quarter 
of  this  Union.  The  "  strikes"  of  1876  faintly  foretoken 
the  commotions  which  will  tear  and  rend  our  social 
fabric  if  the  discordant  elements  which  make  up  the 
population  of  the  United  States  should  ever  get  into 
the  full  jangle  of  discord.  When  the  dreadful  day 
arrives  that  shall  witness  these  hostile  elements  in  full 
battle  array  against  each  other,  those  to  whom  the 
widow  and  the  orphan,  the  aged  and  the  infirm,  the 
weak  and  the  property-owner  will  look  with  the  most 
eager  hope,  if  it  occur  within  their  generation,  will  be 
the  "rebels,"  whose  yell  was  loudest  and  fiercest  on 
the  blood-stained  heights  of  Gettysburg.  Should  this 
awful  day  arrive  when  they  have  passed  away,  then 
will  it  be  to  those,  the  descendants  of  these,  who  were 
taught  at  their  mothers'  knees  that  they  must  stand 
by  the  right,  whatever  may  betide. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

THE     USUAL     COMPARISON     BETWEEN     NORTHERN     AND 
SOUTHERN   CIVILIZATION. 

IT  is  quite  the  fashion  to  institute  comparisons  be 
tween  the  civilization  of  the  South  and  the  civilization 
of  the  North,  always  to  the  very  great  disadvantage 
of  that  of  the  South.  In  October,  1880,  Senator  Conk- 
ling  made  a  speech  in  the  City  of  New  York  which  has 
been  heralded  from  one  end  of  this  Union  to  another 
by  his  claquers,  as  a  very  great  production  of  a  very 
great  man.  Though  the  speech  contains  no  direct 
assertion  that  barbarism  reigns  at  the  South,  whilst 
the  sun  of  civilization  shines  upon  the  North  alone,  its 
whole  warp  and  woof  is  substantially  this.  After 
picturing  a  land  of  violence  and  disorder,  he  said, 
"  The  cause  of  such  a  condition,  and  the  consequences, 
if  it  succeeds,  are  matters  which  no  sane,  intelligent 
man  can  put  out  of  view  ;  and  yet  he  who  discusses 
these  must  be  told,  in  the  coarse  parlance  of  the  day, 
that  he  waves  *  the  bloody  shirt.'  It  is  a  relief  to  re 
member  that  this  phrase  and  the  thing  it  means  is  no 
invention  of  our  politics.  It  dates  back  to  Scotland 
three  centuries  ago.  After  a  massacre  in  Glenfruin, 
not  so  savage  as  has  stained  our  annals,  two  hundred 
and  twenty  widows  rode  on  white  palfreys  to  Stirling 
Tower,  bearing  each  on  a  spear  her  husband's  bloody 
shirt.  The  appeal  waked  Scotland's  slumbering  sword, 
and  outlawry  and  the  block  made  the  name  of  Glen 
fruin  terrible  to  victorious  Clan  Alpine,  even  to  the 
third  and  fourth  generation." 


55 

Mr.  Conkling  was  most  unfortunate  in  his  selection 
for  illustrating  the  barbarism  of  the  South.  Occasions 
may  and  do  arise  in  every  Southern  State  when  widows 
may  exhibit  the  bloody  shirts  of  their  slain  husbands  ; 
and  yet,  while  there  is  a  deep  feeling  of  sympathy  for 
the  widow,  there  is  no  feeling  of  regret  for  the  hus 
band  ;  and  common  consent,  which  has  become  com 
mon  law,  applauds  the  act  of  the  slayer.  These  occa 
sions  arise  when  an  outraged  husband  takes  the  law 
into  his  own  hands,  and  slaughters,  where  he  finds 
him,  whether  at  church  or  at  fair,  the  traitor  who  has 
invaded  the  sanctity  of  his  home  and  corrupted  the 
wife  of  his  bosom.  Mr.  Conkling's  illustration  may 
well  suggest  the  inquiry  whether  that  is  a  lower  civili 
zation  which  justifies  the  outraged  husband  in  slaying 
the  man  who  has  thus  ruined  his  home  and  his  life, 
even  though  it  should  leave  to  a  widow  the  legacy  of 
a  husband's  bloody  shirt ;  or  whether  that  is  a  higher 
civilization  which  exhibits  a  terror-stricken  husband 
thus  wronged  standing  in  the  presence  of  his  wife's 
paramour,  shot-gun  in  hand,  yet  trembling  and  afraid 
to  shoot. 

The  habit  which  in  all  the  Southern  States  prevails 
to  a  more  or  less  extent,  of  protecting  character  by 
holding  him  who  assails  it  to  a  personal  account,  is  also 
constantly  referred  to  as  an  evidence  of  the  barbarism 
of  the  Southern  people.  I  do  not  propose  to  say  one 
word  in  justification  of  the  duello.  But  this  at  least 
can  be  said  of  those  regions  where  it  is  resorted  to. 
The  possessor  of  a  fair  character  may  feel  sure,  unless 
he  do  something  to  forfeit  it,  that  he  will  pass  his  life 


50 

in  full  possession  and  enjoyment  of  it,  exempted  from 
all  danger  of  having  it  besmirched  and  befouled  with 
slanderous  and  calumnious  statements  regarding  him. 

With  this  blessing  attained  by  tolerating  the  duello, 
the  inquiry  may  well  suggest  itself,  whether,  as  an  in 
stitution,  it  is  the  greatest  evil  with  which  society  can 
be  afflicted. 

Is  it  worse  that  a  man  should  lose  his  life  in  a  duel 
than  that,  after  having  lived  blamelessly  and  with  the 
respect  and  esteem  of  his  acquaintances,  he  should  be 
made  the  target  for  every  irresponsible  slanderer  who 
may  choose  to  defame  him,  and  be  brought  down,  after 
a  life  of  credit,  in  sorrow  and  shame  to  the  grave  ? 

On  the  25th  day  of  October,  1880,  the  journal  pub 
lished  in  New  York  City,  called  Truth,  in  an  editorial 
article,  spoke  in  the  following  terms  of  James  Gordon 
Bennett,  Esq.  : 

"  Well,  it  seems  to  be  a  desire  on  the  part  of  Mr. 
Kelly  to  rid  the  community  of  one  of  the  most  despi 
cable,  low-lived,  debauched  scamps  who  ever  disgraced 
his  father's  name  and  brought  odium  on  his  very 
nationality.  Mr.  James  Gordon  Bennett,  since  child 
hood,  has  been  a  drunkard,  an  associate  of  women  of 
the  town,  a  night  brawler,  a  coward,  a  cur.  No  re 
spectable  society  will  admit  him — no  ladies  will  ac 
knowledge  his  suit— no  gentleman  will  shake  him  by 
the  hand.  He  is  forced  to  the  companionship  of  the 
Gunny  Bedford s,  Wrights,  Sanfords,  Ikey  Bells,  Larry 
Jeromes,  and  other  persons  of  more  or  less  respecta 
bility  and  notoriety." 

This  publication  is  made  of  a  man  who   is  the  pro- 


57 

prietor  of  the  most  influential  newspaper  in  the  United 
States  ;  who  is  one  of  the  wealthy  men  of  New  York 
City  ;  who  is  a  member  of  the  Union  Club,  of  New  York 
City,  the  most  prominent  social  institution  in  the  city 
— who  associates  in  that  institution  with  the  leaders 
of  New  York  society,  and  who  visits  at  the  houses  of 
the  leaders  of  New  York  society.  If  these  published 
charges  be  true,  what  sort  of  a  character  can  James 
Gordon  Bennett  have  ?  If  they  be  false,  what  is  the 
value  of  his  character  to  him  ?  Only  those  who  know 
him  personally  —  and  they  must  necessarily  be  few — 
can  know  that  they  are  false,  and  to  the  rest  of  the 
world — who  only  know  him  as  his  character  is  pub 
lished  to  the  world — he  is  the  sort  of  man  that  that 
publication  proclaims  him.  Now,  no  man  of  any  re 
spectability  could  live  in  any  community  in  any  South 
ern  State  who  allowed  such  a  thing  as  this  to  be  pub 
lished  about  him,  without  risking  his  life  in  an  en 
counter  with  the  publisher.  Consequently,  no  sucli 
publications  are  ever  made,  unless  concerning  men 
notoriously  without  character.  Which  is  the  higher 
order  of  civilization — that  which  permits  a  man  to  se 
cure  to  himself  the  enjoyment  of  that  character  which 
a  long  and  blameless  life  has  entitled  him  to,  or  that 
which  compels  him  to  stand  helplessly  still  whilst 
character  thieves  steal  it  from  him  ? 

It  does  not,  therefore,  follow,  because  this  institution 
is  tolerated  to  a  certain  extent  in  the  Southern  States, 
that  the  people  of  those  States  are  barbarians. 

3*. 


58 


CHAPTEE  VII. 

THE  DISCUSSION  IN"  RELATION  TO  POLITICAL  PAR 
TIES  IK  THE  UNION — THE  TRUE  LINE  OF  DIVISION 
BETWEEN  DEMOCRATS  AND  REPUBLICANS — THE  FOUR 
TEENTH  AMENDMENT. 

THE  general  theme  which  we  have  discussed  being 
substantially  the  true  pivot  upon  which  the  difference 
between  the  two  great  political  parties  that  divide  this 
country  turns,  some  remarks  upon  the  respective  aims 
of  those  parties  may  not  be  out  of  place  here. 

There  is  but  one  point  of  difference  between  the 
Republican  party  and  the  Democratic  party  ;  and, 
though  that  point  is  always  carefully  ignored  and  con 
cealed  in  all  party  proclamations,  it  is  broad,  distinct, 
and  well  denned.  It  is  the  aim  of  the  Republican 
party  to  add  to  the  powers  of  the  General  Government — 
to  strengthen  the  hands  of  the  General  Government 
until,  as  is  generally  believed,  that  General  Gov 
ernment  shall  have  full  and  undisputed  power  to 
do  whatever  it  may  determine  to  be  most  for  the 
public  good.  The  Democratic  party,  on  the  other 
hand,  insists  that  the  true  chart  of  the  General 
Government's  powers  are  to  be  found  in  a  strict 
construction  of  the  terms  of  the  original  Constitu 
tion,  as  it  may  be  modified  by  a  construction  of  the 
amendments  in  harmony  with  that  original  Consti 
tution.  The  Democratic  party  insists  that  the  Govern 
ment  shall  have  no  powers — shall  have  no  existence — 


59 

outside  of  what  a  strict  construction  of  the  Constitu 
tion  and  its  amendments  may  give  to  it.  There  is  no 
difference  between  the  parties  on  any  other  point  ; 
there  is  a  radical  difference  between  them  upon  this 
one  point.  There  is  no  difference  between  the  parties 
upon  a  question  of  protective  tariff.  There  are  as 
many  Democrats  in  favor  of  a  protective  tariff  as  there 
are  Eepublicans  in  favor  of  it,  and  there  are  as  many 
Republicans  in  favor  of  free  trade  as  there  are  Demo 
crats  in  favor  of  free  trade.  There  is  no  difference 
between  the  two  parties  upon  questions  affecting  the 
currency.  There  are  as  many  Democrats  in  favor  of 
an  exclusively  metallic  currency  as  there  are  Repub 
licans  in  favor  of  it ;  and  there  are  as  many  Repub 
licans  who  favor  a  system  of  inflated  paper  currency 
as  there  are  Democrats  who  favor  such  a  system. 
There  is  no  point  of  difference  of  this  sort  between  the 
two  parties.  There  is  but  one  single  point  of  differ 
ence  between  them,  and  that  is  the  point  mentioned. 
Whatever  a  Republican's  opinions  may  be  touching 
the  tariff  or  the  currency,  yet  he  favors  a  strong  central 
government.  Whatever  a  Democrat's  opinion  may  be 
upon  either  of  these  matters,  yet  he  insists  upon  hold 
ing  the  Government  down  to  the  powers  which  a  strict 
construction  of  the  Constitution  will  give  to  it.  All 
Republicans  are  found  upon  one  side  of  this  proposi 
tion,  and  all  Democrats  are  found  upon  the  other  side 
of  it ;  and  for  the  past  fifteen  years  the  Democratic 
party  has  been  making  a  great,  perhaps  a  fatal,  mis 
take,  in  not  forcing  upon  the  country  an  acknowledg- 


60 

ment  of  this  fact.  TVith  this  as  the  point,  and  the 
only  point,  of  difference  between  the  two  parties,  it 
has,  foi1  the  last  fifteen  years,  permitted  the  Republican 
party  to  stand  forth  before  the  world  arrogating  to  itself 
the  claim  that  it  is  the  party  of  law  and  order — that 
its  aims  are  for  the  preservation  of  property  and  the 
protection  of  vested  rights  ;  whilst  their  antagonists, 
the  Democratic  party,  are  a  party  of  turbulence  and  dis 
order — a  party  made  up  of  all  the  bankrupt  and  discon 
tented  elements  of  the  country,  opposed  to  everything 
conservative,  and  allied  to  everything  revolutionary.  Not 
only  has  the  Democratic  party  permitted  the  real  point 
at  issue  to  be  ignored,  but  it  has  given  only  too  much 
show  of  reason  to  the  charges  of  its  adversary. 
Wherever,  in  the  Union,  any  ism  has  taken  possession 
of  the  heads  of  crack-brained  men,  the  Democratic  party 
has  sought  to  gather  the  disciples  of  this  ism  into  its 
folds.  It  has  eagerly  sought  the  alliance  of  the  Green- 
backer  of  Maine,  the  Greenbacker  of  Indiana,  the  Kear- 
neyite  and  sand-lotter  of  California,  and  the  repudiator 
of  Virginia. 

It  has  sought  companionship  with  all  these  noxious 
social  elements,  and  they  have  fastened  themselves  on 
it  like  barnacles  on  a  ship,  until  it  is  hard  to  tell  the 
Democratic  ship  from  the  corroding  barnacles.  The 
Democratic  party  will  not  deserve  to  administer  the 
affairs  of  this  Government  until  it  shall  kick  off  from 
itself  all  these  filthy  barnacles— until  it  shall  challenge 
the  Republican  party's  claim  that  it  is  the  party  of  law 
and  order  and  preservation  of  property — until  it  shall 


61 

present  itself  before  the  country  as  emphatically  the 
party  of  law  and  order  and  property.  When  it  shall 
do  this  ;  when  it  shall  have  spurned  from  itself  every 
accessory  which  would  lift  it  into  power  through 
;  lunatic  isms  and  rascally  devices  for  theft  ;  when  it 
shall  have  done  this,  and  forced  its  adversary  to  join 
in  battle  with  it  upon  the  question  of  whether  the 
ancient  theory  of  a  government  of  limited  powers 
shall  be  preserved,  or  whether  it  shall  be  overthrown 
and  a  government  of  unlimited  powers  be  substituted 
in  its  stead — then  it  may  hope  to  come  into  the  con 
trol  of  this  Government.  But  it  never  will  so  come 
into  control  until  it  does  this,  and  it  will  not  deserve  to 
rule  this  Union  until  it  does  this. 

The  Republican  party's  theory  of  what  the  powers 
of  the  General  Government  are  and  ought  to  be,  is  best 
illustrated  by  considering  the  political  cases  decided 
by  the  Republican  Supreme  Court  in  the  spring  of 
1880. 

In  those  cases,  that  court  laid  this  down  as  the 
theory  of  our  Government  under  the  amendments  to 
the  Constitution  adopted  since  the  war.  It  held  that 
the  Congress  of  the  United  States  was  empowered  by 
those  amendments  to  enact  any  law  that  it  thought 
necessary  to  secure  to  citizens  the  equal  protection  of 
the  laws,  and  that  it  .  was  the  duty  of  the  executive  and 
judicial  departments  of  the  Government  to  carry  out 
and  enforce  any  such  laws  as  the  Congress  might  enact. 
Two  of  the  particular  cases  in  which  the  doctrine  was 
applied  were  these  :  Congress  had  enacted  a  statute 


62 

providing  substantially  that  in  every  criminal  prose 
cution  or  civil  proceeding  before  a  State  court,  if  the 
defendant  would  make  oath  that  he  could  not  secure 
the  enforcement  in  the  State  court  of  a  right  guaran 
teed  to  him  by  the  Constitution  or  laws  of  the  United 
States,  his  case  should  be  removed  for  trial  into  the 
United  States  Court.  A  citizen  of  Virginia  was  in 
dicted  in  a  court  of  the  State  of  Virginia  for  the  crime 
of  murder,  which  was  a  violation  of  the  laws  of  Vir 
ginia,  but  no  violation  of  the  laws  of  the  United  States. 
He  made  the  affidavit  prescribed  by  the  statute,  and 
had  his  case  removed  for  trial  into  the  Circuit  Court  of 
the  United  States.  The  State  of  Virginia  resisted,  this. 
Now,  it  is  obvious,  if  the  removal  could  be  sustained, 
that  this  was  converting  the  courts  of  the  United 
States  into  a  machine  for  enforcing  the  laws  of  the 
State  of  Virginia,  made  for  the  prevention  of  crime. 
It  was  certainly  converting  the  judicial  department  of 
the  United  States  to  uses  that  it  was  never  intended 
for  in  its  inception.  Murder  being  no  violation  of  any 
law  of  the  United  States,  for  the  United  States  Court 
to  take  jurisdiction  of  the  prosecution  of  a  man  charged 
with  murder,  was  for  it  to  take  upon  itself  the  duty  of 
vindicating  the  offended  sovereignty  of  the  State  of 
Virginia,  and  of  enforcing  the  laws  of  Virginia  made  to 
suppress  that  crime. 

The  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  held  that 
it  was  within  the  constitutional  powers  of  Congress  to 
enact  such  legislation,  if  it  was  in  its  judgment  neces 
sary  for  securing  to  citizens  the  equal  protection  of  the 
laws. 


63 

The  second  case  was  this  :  Congress  had  enacted 
substantially  that  if  any  State  officer  should  adminis 
ter  his  office  in  such  a  way  as  to  deprive  citizens  of  the 
equal  protection  of  the  laws,  he  should  be  liable  to 
prosecution  and  punishment  in  the  Circuit  Court  of  the 
United  States. 

A  judge  of  one  of  the  courts  of  the  State  of  Virginia 
was  indicted  in  the  United  States  Court  for  depriving 
citizens  of  the  equal  protection  of  the  laws,  by  system 
atically  omitting  a  certain  class  of  citizens  from  his 
jury  lists.  He  pleaded  that,  being  a  judicial  officer, 
vested  with  the  exercise  of  a  discretion,  he  could  not 
be  arraigned  as  for  a  criminal  charge  for  executing  the 
functions  of  his  office  as  he  best  knew  how,  and  that  if 
he  failed  to  give  accused  parties  all  their  rights  under 
the  law,  it  was  their  duty  to  seek  a  reversal  of  his 
judgments  through  the  ordinary  processes  of  the  law. 
The  Supreme  Court,  however,  held  the  act  to  be  within 
the  constitutional  powers  of  Congress. 

Now  if,  under  the  Constitution  of  our  Government, 
Congress  is  invested  with  these  powers,  it  is  idle  to 
talk  of  its  being  a  government  of  limited  powers — the 
General  Government  is  one  of  as  full  and  despotic  pow 
ers  as  any  that  has  ever  existed  on  the  globe.  If  it  be 
true  that  it  has  power  to  enact  every  law  that  is  neces 
sary  to  secure  to  citizens  the  equal  protection  of  the 
laws,  and  if  it  be  true  that  it  is  the  sole  and  exclusive 
judge  of  what  legislation  is  necessary  for  securing  to 
citizens  the  equal  protection  of  the  laws,  then  there 
is  practically  nothing  which  the  Government  of 


64 

the  United  States  cannot  accomplish.  All  talk  of  a 
government  of  limited  powers  is  simply  bosh,  and  we 
have  a  government  clothed  with  as  supreme  powers  as 
the  most  tyrannical  despot  could  wish.  Constitutional 
limitations  are  gone,  and  home  rule  and  local  self- 
government  are  ended.  Under  the  right  of  removal  for 
trial,  Congress  may  fill  every  State  with  its  agents, 
placed  there  to  carry  out  the  will  of  Congress.  How 
ever  heinous  may  be  their  crimes — however  they  shock 
decency  and  violate  the  fundamental  principles  of  the 
society  where  they  may  be — yet  can  Congress  cover 
them  with  the  panoply  of  a  perfect  immunity  by  pro 
viding  that  if  the  community  attempt  to  prosecute 
them  for  their  crimes,  their  causes  shall  be  removed 
for  trial  into  the  Federal  courts.  Not  only  this,  but 
under  the  judge's  case  it  may  operate  directly  upon 
each  citizen  of  each  community.  It  may  provide  that 
if  any  citizen  dare  place  himself  in  opposition  to  the 
will  of  Congress,  he  may  be  seized,  carried  off  to 
another  State,  tried  for  a  crime  in  a  Federal  court,  and 
punished  as  the  judge  of  that  court  may  see  fit.  If 
Congress  can  act  upon  the  case  of  a  State  judge  in  this 
manner,  so  can  it  act  upon  the  Governor  of  the  State, 
the  members  of  the  Legislature  of  the  State,  each  other 
officer  of  the  State,  and  indeed  upon  every  citizen  of 
the  State.  Nay,  more  ;  if  it  have  power  to  punish  any 
officer  of  the  State  for  executing  a  law  which  in  its 
working  deprives  citizens  of  the  equal  protection  of  the 
laws,  then  in  the  plenitude  of  its  powers  it  may  act 
directly  upon  the  law  itself,  and  by  its  own  act  repeal 
that  law. 


65 

TTith  this  as  the  theory  of  our  Government,  what  is 
the  use  of  talking  of  our  Government  being  a  complex 
government,  composed  of  States  which  have  certain 
powers  independently  to  themselves,  over  which  the 
General  Government  has  no  control,  and  a  General  Gov 
ernment  invested  with  certain  powers  which  the  States 
cannot  affect?  If  this  is  the  form  of  our  Government, 
then  the  States  have  no  provinces  reserved  to  them- 
selves.  The  General  Government  has  complete  jurisdic 
tion  and  power  over  all  branches  and  departments  of 
aff  ai  rs. 

It  should  not  be  forgotten,  that  when  the  Supreme 
Court  pronounced  its  opinion  in  these  cases,  that  great 
jurist,  Mr.  Justice  Stephen  J.  Field,  seconded  by 
Mr.  Justice  Clifford,  dissented,  and  lifted  his  voice  in 
an  ever-memorable  protest  against  the  doctrine  of  the 
court. 

The  Democratic  theory  of  the  Government  of  the 
United  States  is  that  it  has  no  existence,  save  as  it  is 
created  by  the  powers  that  the  people  of  the  United 
States  have  granted  to  it,  and  that  those  powers  are 
clearly  defined  and  limited  in  the  Constitution.  The 
Democratic  theory  is  an  expression  of  the  proposition 
that  the  more  nearly  government  can  be  reduced  to  a 
system  of  home  rule — local  self-government,  the  more 
perfect  the  government  is,  and  the  greater  the  liberty 
and  happiness  of  the  citizen  will  be.  It  contends  that 
the  General  Government  was  never  intended  to  have 
any  voice  in  matters  of  a  local  nature.  That  its  province 
was  intended  to  be  the  custody  of  those  matters  which 


66 

arc  of  general  concern,  such  as  peace  and  war,  regula 
tion  of  tho  currency,  regulation  of  intercourse  be 
tween  this  country  and  foreign  countries,  and  between 
the  different  States,  regulation  of  weights  and  measures, 
and  such  other  matters  in  which  all  the  citizens  of 
all  the  States  are  equally  interested,  and  that  those 
subjects  over  which  it  was  intended  that  it  should  have 
control  are  specifically  expressed  in  the  Constitution. 
Its  proposition,  is  that  the  General  Government  has  no 
concern  except  with  those  matters  in  which  all  the 
citizens  of  all  the  States  are  equally  interested  ;  and 
that  those  matters  in  which  each  neighborhood  is  alone 
interested  should  be  under  the  control  of  that  neigh 
borhood.  Thus,  as  each  citizen  of  tho  United  States 
is  equally  interested  in  a  uniform  currency  of  fixed 
value,  and  as  each  citizen  of  the  United  States  is 
equally  interested  in  a  uniform  system  of  weights  and 
measures,  tho  General  Government  ought  to  have  con 
trol  over  the  currency  and  the  system  of  weights  and 
measures.  Tho  citizen  of  Texas  is  as  much  interested 
in  these  as  the  citizen  of  Massachusetts  is,  and  the  citi 
zen  of  Massachusetts  is  as  much  interested  in  them  as 
the  citizen  of  Texas  is.  But  the  citizen  of  Massachu 
setts  is  not  especially  interested  in  the  terms  and  con 
ditions  upon  which  real  estate  may  be  passed  from  one 
person  to  another  in  Texas  ;  nor  is  tho  citizen  of  Texas 
interested  in  the  regulations  that  may  be  prescribed 
for  selling  eggs  and  butter  in  Massachusetts.  These 
are  matters  of  local  concern,  over  which  each  community 
ought  to  have  exclusive  control.  So  the  preservation 


67 

of  order  in  each  community  (and  under  this  head  it 
is  intended  to  include  all  measures  for  the  prevention 
and  punishment  of  all  crimes  save  those  that  are  viola 
tions  of  some  one  of  the  enumerated  powers  of  the 
General  Government)  is  also  properly  a  matter  of  local 
self-government,  of  which  each  community  should 
have  exclusive  control. 

Now,  let  us  consider  some  of  the  reasons  for  each  one 
of  these  two  theories. 

The  Republican  party  claims  that  there  is  a  constant 
and  unending  conflict  in  progress  between  the  negroes 
and  the  white  people  of  the  Southern  States,  and  that 
it  is  necessary  that  the  General  Government  should 
have  power  to  interfere  in  that  conflict  to  protect  the 
negro,  otherwise  the  white  man  will  make  him  the  vic 
tim  of  the  most  diabolical  oppression.  This  I  believe 
to  he  the  entire  reason  why  the  Republican  party  de 
mands  that  the  Government  shall  have  power  to  inter 
fere  in  the  local  affairs  of  the  States.  Certainly  no 
persons  of  any  party  ever  demanded  powers  of  this 
sort  for  the  General  Government  until  the  demand  was 
asserted  that  the  negro  should  be  taken  under  the  pro 
tecting  wing  of  the  Government.  The  preceding  por 
tion  of  this  essay  was  devoted  to  showing  that  no  con 
test  between  the  races  exists  when  they  are  let  alone  ; 
therefore,  if  the  Republican  proposition  were  not  one 
vicious  in  itself,  still  no  occasion  has  arisen  for  resort 
ing  to  it.  The  strongest  statement  of  the  reasons  why 
the  Republican  proposition  is  one  vicious  in  itself,  is  a 
statement  of  the  reasons  for  the  preposition  of  the 
Democratic  party. 


68 

The  beginnings  of  all  governments  of  which  we  have 
any  account,  save  that  of  this  Union,  have  been  more 
or  less  despotic.  All  the  world  was  at  one  time  more 
or  less  barbarous,  and  amongst  barbarians,  govern 
ment  means  simply  power.  He  who  is  endowed  with 
sufficient  power  to  subdue  others  around  him  to  the 
execution  of  his  will,  founds  the  government  which  is 
exercised  over  his  neighbors.  In  the  commencement, 
therefore,  this  Government  is  nothing  but  the  expres 
sion  of  the  will  of  this  n;Lr.  In  all  governments  of 
which  we  have  any  account  there  has  been  always 
a  constant,  never-ending  struggle  between  the  citizens 
upon  the  one  hand  and  the  government  upon  the 
other.  Upon  the  part  of  the  citizen  the  effort  has 
been  to  curb  the  powers  of  the  government — to  hedge 
it  around  with  fences  and  safeguards  for  his  own 
rights  of  person  and  property — to  erect  dams  and  bul 
warks  between  his  personal  rights  and  the  govern 
ment's  powers.  Upon  the  part  of  the  government  the 
effort  has  been  to  retain  as  much  power  over  the  citi 
zen's  person  and  property  as  it  can.  The  history  of 
every  nation  is  nothing  but  the  story  of  this  contest. 
Every  people  has  its  landmarks  along  the  progress'  of 
the  strife.  In  the  history  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race, 
some  of  the  most  glorious  deeds  that  illustrate  the 
annals  of  man  are  monuments  to  victories  achieved  by 
the  people  over  the  crown.  Magna  Charta,  the  Petition 
of  Right,  the  great  Rebellion,  the  habeas  corpus  act, 
the  revolution  of  1688 — all  of  these  are  mere  eras  in 
the  history  of  this  great  battle. 


69 

At  the  time  when  the  American  colonies  threw  off 
their  allegiance  to  the  Crown  of  England,  government 
al  science  was  in  its  palmiest  days.  In  the  period 
between  it  and  the  Reformation  the  profoundest  minds 
of  the  world  had  been  constantly  occupied  in  its  con 
sideration.  The  thinkers  of  this  country  had  been  no 
less  engaged  with  it  than  the  thinkers  of  Europe,  and 
the  conclusion  had  been  reached  that  the  only  province 
of  government  was  to  take  care  of  those  matters  of  a 
general  nature  in  which  all  are  concerned,  leaving 
matters  of  a  local  nature  to  be  cared  for  as  far  as  possi 
ble  by  local  methods. 

The  bottom  reason  for  this,  being  the  true  proposi 
tion  of  governmental  science,  is  that  each  and  every  in 
dividual  has  a  natural  and  an  inherent  right  to  abso 
lute  liberty  of  thought,  and  equally  to  absolute  liberty 
of  action,  save  and  except  that  he  must  not  use  his 
liberty  of  action  so  as  to  trespass  upon  a  right  of  an 
other  person.  Now,  authority  over  the  individual  has 
a  right  to  restrain  his  action  whenever  that  action 
amounts  to  a  trespass  upon  another's  rights  ;  but  when 
it  restrains  his  liberty  of  action  in  what  would  not  be 
a  trespass  upon  another's  rights,  it  is  unjust,  and  is 
neither  more  nor,  less  than  tyranny.  Naturally  those 
who  are  nearest  to  the  person  who  complains  that  the 
particular  act  of  an  individual  injures  him,  are  better 
able  to  judge  of  the  merits  of  the  controversy  than 
those  at  a  distance.  It  therefore  follows,  that  the  more 
narrow  the  focus  of  local  government  is  made,  so  that 
it  be  wide  enough  to  accomplish  the  ends  of  govern- 


TO 

ment,  the  less  likely  the  citizen  is  to  have  his  natural 
and  inherent  right  to  freedom  of  action  unjustly  cir 
cumscribed. 

Those  Americans  who  framed  the  Constitution  of 
our  government  had  these  principles  deeply  instilled 
into  their  minds,  and  they  determined  to  frame  the 
government  with  a  strict  regard  to  them.  They  de 
termined  to  grant  to  it  control  over  all  those  matters 
in  which  all  the  citizens  of  all  parts  of  the  country  had 
an  equal  interest,  but  they  determined  to  withhold 
from  it  power  to  interfere  in  matters  in  which  only  the 
people  of  the  neighborhood  were  interested.  The  gov 
ernment  which  they  framed  was  the  perfection  of 
human  reason,  and  in  its  practical  operation  it  secured 
the  very  largest  liberty  and  happiness  to  the  citizen. 
It  was  only  when  the  Republican  party  insisted  upon 
its  overthrow,  and  upon  the  introduction  of  the  propo 
sition  that  the  General  Government  should  be  endow 
ed  with  power  to  thrust  its  interfering  hand  into  all 
matters  of  a  local  nature,  at  its  pleasure,  that  the  har 
mony  of  the  system  has  been  turned  into  discord. 
From  the  day  that  proposition  was  affirmed  to  be  a 
part  of  the  theory  of  our  Government,  our  Eden  has 
been  turned  into  Eden  after  the  introduction  of  sin. 

Prior  to  the  war  between  the  sections,  no  sane  man 
would  have  claimed  that  the  Government  of  the  United 
States  had  any  power  whatever  to  interfere  with  the 
local  affairs  of  any  community.  It  is  only  since  the 
war  that  the  claim  has  been  asserted  for  it.  and  that 
claim  is  based  upon  the  Fourteenth  Amendment  to  the 


71 

Constitution  of  the  United  States,  which  was  proposed 
in  Congress  in  18G6,  and  declared  to  be  adopted  as  a 
part  of  the  Constitution  in  1868,  and  it  is  upon  the  fol 
lowing  provisions  of  that  amendment :  "  No  State  shall 
make  or  enforce  any  law  which  shall  abridge  the  priv 
ileges  or  immunities  of  citizens  of  the  United  States, 
nor  shall  any  State  deprive  any  person  of  life,  liberty, 
or  property,  without  due  process  of  law  ;  nor  deny  to 
any  person  within  its  jurisdiction  the  equal  protection  of 
the  laws. 

"  Congress  shall  have  power  to  enforce  the  provisions 
of  this  amendment  by  appropriate  legislation." 

It  is  claimed  that  the  entire  theory  of  the  Govern 
ment  was  overthrown,  and  a  new  theory  adopted,  when 
this  amendment  was  incorporated  as  a  part  of  the  Con 
stitution.  I  do  not  believe  that  the  people  of  the  United 
States  would  ever  have  permitted  it  to  become  a  part 
of  their  Constitution,  if  they  had  understood  that  such 
momentous  consequences  were  to  be  claimed  from  its 
adoption.  Had  they  understood  it,  their  answer,  like 
that  of  the  English  barons  of  old,  would  have  been, 
"  Nolumus  leges  Americae  mutare." 

The  people  of  New  York  never  would  have  agreed 
that  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  might  enact  a 
law  providing  that,  upon  the  complaint  of  a  citizen  of 
Texas,  a  citizen  of  the  interior  of  the  State  of  New 
York  might  be  seized  by  a  United  States  marshal, 
hauled  oft'  to  Texas  and  tried  there,  away  from  friends 
and  witnesses,  before  a  United  States  judge,  and 
locked  up  forever  in  a  Texas  penitentiary.  Yet  just 


72 

this  the  Republican  party  claims  that  the  Fourteenth 
Amendment  lias  empowered  Congress  to  do,  and  just 
this  claim  the  Republican  Supreme  Court  sustains. 

It  is  useless  to  deny  that  the  decisions  that  the  court 
made  go  this  length.  It  is  idle  to  say  that  they  do 
not  authorize  Congress  to  have  a  citizen  dragged  out 
of  his  own  State  into  another  for  trial.  The  court  ex 
pressly  announces  the  proposition,  that  the  methods 
for  securing  to  citizens  the  equal  protection  of  the  laws 
are  left  to  Congress,  and  if  it  had  not  announced  the 
proposition,  it  inevitably  flowed  from  the  decision  that 
they  made.  Its  decision  was,  that  Congress  might 
provide  that  a  citizen  of  New  York,  charged  with  hav 
ing  committed  a  crime  in  an  extreme  eastern  county 
of  the  State  of  New  York,  might  be  hauled  off  for 
trial  before  a  United  States  court  sitting  in  an  ex 
treme  western  county  of  the  State.  Now,  there  is  no 
obligation  resting  upon  Congress  to  have  a  United 
States  court  for  New  York.  It  may  provide  that  the 
business  proper,  for  a  United  States  court,  arising  in 
the  State  of  New  York  may  be  transacted  in  a  United 
States  court  held  in  Pennsylvania.  So  that  it  may 
be  provided  that  the  New  Yorker,  charged  with  hav- 
committed  a  crime  in  the  extreme  eastern  part  of 
the  State  of  New  York,  may  be  summoned  for  trial 
before  the  United  States  court  in  Pennsylvania.  And 
if  it  may  be  provided  that  he  can  be  carried  there,  he 
may  then  be  equally  carried  to  Texas. 

The  inconsistency  of  the  Supreme  Court  in  its  con 
struction  of  this  amendment  is  utterly  incomprehensi- 


73 

ble  to  plain  men.  It  first  came  before  it  for  construc 
tion  in  the  famous  Slaughter  House  cases,  reported  in 
IGth  Wallace.  In  that  case  the  material  facts  were 
these  :  The  carpet-bag  Legislature  of  Louisiana  had  es 
tablished  one  of  the  most  odious  monopolies  that  ever 
disgraced  the  statute-book  of  any  people.  It  had.  given 
sixteen  men  the  exclusive  right  of  slaughtering  all 
animals  used  for  food  in  the  parishes  of  Orleans,  Jef 
ferson,  and  St.  Bernard,  containing  1154  square  miles 
and  between  two  and  three  hundred  thousand  people 
— containing  the  City  of  Orleans.  It  practically  took 
away  from  the  butchers  of  New  Orleans,  of  whom 
there  were  more  than  a  thousand,  their  means  of  liveli 
hood,  and  left  them  and  their  families  to  subsist  as 
best  they  could  under  the  tribute  that  they  were  forced 
to  pay  these  sixteen  monopolists.  How  much  was  paid 
this  Legislature  to  pass  this  law  I  know  not.  The 
butchers  at  once  attacked  the  act  in  the  courts  of 
Louisiana  as  forbidden  by  the  clause  of  the  Fourteenth 
Amendment  quoted,  because  it  abridged  the  privileges 
and  immunities  of  citizens  of  the  United  States,  and 
deprived  them  of  the  equal  protection  of  the  laws. 
The  Louisiana  courts  being  composed  of  judges  that 
were  a  part  of  the  same  carpet-bag  government, 
decided  against  them,  and  they  carried  their  case  to 
the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States.  And  what 
will  the  unlearned  reader,  who  has  informed  himself 
of  what  that  court  held  the  Fourteenth  Amendment 
to  mean,  in  the  cases  that  I  have  been  remarking  on, 
think  that  it  held  in  this  butchers'  case  ?  It  held  that 

4 


74 

the  Louisiana  law  did  not  deprive  citizens  of  the  equal 
protection  of  the  laws,  and  that  the  only  privileges 
and  immunities  of  citizens  that  it  was  intended  by  it 
to  protect  were  those  privileges  and  immunities  that  a 
citizen  has  in  virtue  of  his  character  as  a  citizen  of  the 
United  States — such  as  the  right  to  petition  Congress, 
the  right  to  protection  on  the  high  seas,  and  the  right 
to  travel  from  one  State  to  another.  But  that  all  the 
ordinary  matters  of  personal  right— those  fundamental 
matters  of  citizenship,  without  which  human  liberty 
cannot  exist — were  left  by  the  amendment  outside  the 
pale  of  its  protection.  To  his  eternal  honor  be  it  said, 
that,  though  a  Democrat  of  the  strictest  sect,  Mr. 
Justice  Stephen  J.  Field  protested  against  this  emas 
culation  of  the  amendment.  This  decision  was  made 
in  1872,  when  General  Grant  and  the  Republican  party 
were  administering  the  Government  pretty  much  to 
suit  themselves,  and  without  the  slightest  regard  to 
the  Constitution,  so  that  many  persons  will  feel  dis 
posed  to  sympathize  with  the  court  in  its  endeavor  to 
curb  the  powers  of  the  Government.  But  if  this  odious 
destruction  of  the  very  existence  of  citizens  was  not 
forbidden  by  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  because  to 
hold  so  would  have  been  to  make  an  unwarrantable 
invasion  into  the  scope  of  the  State  Government,  how 
is  it  to  be  said  that  securing  to  citizens  the  equal  pro 
tection  of  the  laws  authorizes  Congress  to  absolutely 
destroy  all  State  governments?  The  substance  of  the 
recent  decisions  was  that  Congress  might  do  what  it 
thought  proper  to  secure  to  citizens  the  equal  protec- 


75 

tion  of  the  laws  when  they  were  being  denied  them. 
But  if  this  were  true,  wras  not  the  Supreme  Court 
hound  to  destroy  any  State  law  which  was  palpably 
denying  to  citizens  equal  protection  of  the  laws  ? 

Since  such  radical  results  have  been  worked  by 
incorporating  this  amendment  into  the  Constitution, 
I  may  be  pardoned  for  giving  the  history  of  its  adop 
tion. 

In  1868,  when  it  was  proclaimed  to  have  been 
adopted,  the  Union  consisted  of  thirty-seven  States. 
The  Constitution  requires  the  assent  of  three  fourths 
of  the  States  of  the  Union  to  an  amendment  before  it 
can  become  a  part  of  that  instrument.  On  the  21st 
of  July,  1868,  Congress  passed  a  joint  resolution,  de- 
.  claring  that  three  fourths  of  the  States  having  ratified 
the  amendment,  it  had  become  a  part  of  the  Constitu 
tion  ;  and  on  the  28th  of  July  the  Secretary  of  State 
made  public  proclamation  to  the  same  effect.  The 
Union  consisted  of  thirty-seven  States  at  that  time, 
Colorado  having  been  admitted  since  ;  and  twenty- 
seven  and  three  quarters  being  three  fourths  of  thirty- 
seven,  it  consequently  required  the  assent  of  twenty- 
eight  States  to  make  the  amendment  a  part  of  the 
Constitution.  When  it  was  submitted  to  the  Legisla 
tures  of  the  States,  the  following  voted  for  its  adop 
tion,  to  wit  :  Alabama,  Arkansas,  Connecticut,  Florida, 
Illinois,  Indiana,  Iowa,  Kansas,  Louisiana,  Maine,  Mas 
sachusetts,  Michigan,  Minnesota,  Missouri,  Nebraska, 
Nevada,  New  Hampshire,  New  Jersey,  New  York, 
Ohio,  Oregon,  Pennsylvania,  Rhode  Island,  Tennessee, 


76 

Vermont,  and  West  Virginia.  These,  all  told,  amounted 
to  only  twenty-six,  two  less  than  enough  to  adopt  it. 
But  almost  as  soon  as  the  States  of  New  Jersey  and  Ohio 
voted  to  ratify  it,  they  rescinded  their  votes,  and  that 
long  before  enough  of  the  other  States  had  ratified  it 
to  make  three  fourths  of  all,  so  that  they  are  properly 
to  be  put  down  as  States  voting  against  it.  The 
States  that  voted  to  reject  it  were  New  Jersey,  Ohio, 
Kentucky,  Maryland,  Delaware,  Georgia,  North  Caro 
lina,  South  Carolina,  Texas,  and  Virginia.  The  States 
of  California,  Wisconsin,  and  Mississippi  took  no  action 
upon  it,  and  are,  therefore,  to  be  considered  as  voting 
to  reject  it.  The  count,  therefore,  stood  twenty-four 
States  voting  to  ratify  the  amendment  and  thirteen 
voting  to  reject  it.  On  this  count,  therefore,  it  was  lost 
for  want  of  the  votes  of  four  States. 

In  this  condition  of  affairs,  Congress  passed  an  act 
which  provided  that  the  so-called  "  Rebel"  States 
should  be  parcelled  out  into  five  military  districts, 
with  an  army  officer  not  below  the  rank  of  brigadier- 
general  to  command  each  district.  The  act  made  this 
officer  supreme  dictator  in  his  district.  All  the  laws  of 
each  State  in  his  district  were  subject  to  his  will,  and 
might  be  repealed  by  his  order.  He  was  empowered 
to  authorize  the  local  tribunals  to  sit  and  try  civil 
causes  and  persons  accused  of  crime  ;  but  he  might, 
in  his  discretion,  supersede  these  tribunals  in  either 
case,  and  substitute  military  commissions  for  them. 
The  only  limitation  upon  the  power  of  this  officer  was 
a  provision  that  he  was  not  to  inflict  capital  punish- 


77 

ment  without  the  sanction  of  the  President.  It  is  hard 
to  contemplate  the  provisions  of  this  act,  at  this  distant 
day,  without  a  shudder.  It  placed  the  liberties,  and 
the  fortunes,  and  the  lives,  to  a  certain  extent,  of  all 
the  citizens  of  the  Southern  States,  absolutely  under 
the  whims  and  caprices  of  a  military  satrap. 

This  act  contained  a  further  provision,  that  when 
any  one  of  the  States  affected  by  it  should  have  rati 
fied  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  that  State  should 
become  entitled  to  a  representation  in  Congress,  and 
the  provisions  of  the  act  should  no  longer  be  applicable 
to  it.  It  is  not  difficult  to  imagine  that  these  States 
would  have  hastened  to  ratify  this  amendment,  or  to 
do  things  far  more  serious  than  that  to  escape  from  the 
situation  in  which  this  law  placed  them.  Accordingly, 
the  States  of  Georgia,  North  Carolina,  South  Carolina, 
Texas,  and  Virginia  reversed  the  action  which  their 
Legislatures  had  previously  taken  upon  it,  and  ratified 
the  amendment.  This  made  twenty-nine  States  vot 
ing  to  adopt  it,  against  eight  voting  against  its  adop 
tion.  In  this  way  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  which 
is  held  to  have  worked  a  complete  overthrow  of  our 
institutions  and  a  complete  revolution  in  the  theory  of 
our  Government,  was  incorporated  into  the  Constitu 
tion  of  the  United  States.  If  that  amendment  were 
not  in  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  no  living 
man  would  claim  that  Congress  has  any  power  to 
meddle  in  the  local  affairs  of  a  State  ;  and  yet  it  is  in 
the  Constitution  by  the  proceedings  that  have  been 
detailed. 


78 

I  venture  the  assertion  that  no  such  radical  change 
as  this  was  ever  worked  in  the  institutions  of  any 
people  with  the  semblance  of  a  constitutional  govern 
ment,  by  such  means. 

It  might  be  well  for  the  people  of  the  North  to  pon 
der  on  this  state  of  facts.  If  the  Constitution  may  be 
amended  by  such  proceedings  as  these,  the  poisoned 
chalice  may  be  commended  to  their  own  lips.  Massa 
chusetts  and  New  York  might  be  converted  into  Mili 
tary  District  No.  1,  and  held  thus  until  they  gave  their 
approval  to  a  constitutional  amendment  abandoning 
their  just  weight  in  the  Federal  Government. 

Now,  notwithstanding  all  I  have  said,  I  am  yet  a 
friend  to  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  if  only  one  of 
its  provisions  were  stricken  from  it,  to  wit  :  its  fifth 
section,  which  gives  to  Congress  power  to  enforce  its 
provisions  by  appropriate  legislation.  There  has  been 
no  grander  declaration  of  human  rights  since  Magna 
Charta  than  the  first  section  of  the  Fourteenth  Amend 
ment.  Previous  to  the  time  of  its  adoption,  there  was 
no  definition  of  citizenship  of  the  United  States— in 
deed,  some  of  the  foremost  statesmen  that  the  Union 
had  ever  had,  had  denied  that  there  could  be  a  citizen 
ship  of  the  United  States,  further  than  that  citizenship 
inhered  in  the  individual  by  reason  of  his  citizenship 
of  his  State.  This  was  an  evil  which  ought  to  have 
been  cured.  No  one,  therefore,  can  object  to  the  pro 
vision  which  defines  what  shall  constitute  citizenship 
of  the  Union.  It  is  right  that  the  States  should  be  in 
hibited  to  abridge  those  privileges  and  immunities  of 


79 

a  citizen  which  are  fundamental,  and  without  which 
true  liberty  cannot  exist.  No  State  or  other  authority 
ought  to  be  permitted  to  deny  to  any  person  the  equal 
protection  of  the  laws,  nor  ought  any  person  to  be  de 
prived  of  life,  liberty,  or  property,  without  due  process 
of  law.  As  general  propositions  of  great  value,  no 
sensible  person  could  be  found  who  would  dispute 
these ;  and  most,  if  not  all,  enlightened  Democrats 
would  admit  themselves  glad  to  see  these  provisions 
in  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  if  they  stood 
there  simply  as  provisions  prohibitory  upon  the  power 
of  the  States,  without  the  fifth  clause  empowering 
Congress  to  enforce  them  by  such  legislation  as  it 
might  think  proper.  The  Constitution,  as  it  came 
from  the  hands  of  its  framers,  contained  numerous 
provisions  prohibiting  certain  classes  of  legislation  to 
the  States,  such  as  the  prohibition  of  laws  impairing 
the  obligation  of  contracts,  the  granting  of  titles  of 
nobility,  the  making  of  bills  of  credit,  etc.  Yet  it 
gave  Congress  no  legislative  power  over  these  subjects 
in  case  the  States  should  legislate  in  defiance  of  the 
Constitutional  prohibitions.  The  Federal  judiciary 
was  provided  as  the  guard  to  the  Constitution,  and 
given  power  to  annul  and  undo  whatever  the  States 
should  attempt  to  do  in  opposition  to  its  mandates. 

From  the  beginning  of  the  Government  down  to  the 
period  when  the  late  civil  war  terminated,  this  instru 
mentality  was  found  abundant  for  the  preservation  of  the 
Constitution,  and  for  holding  State  legislation  within 
the  limits  assigned  to  it. 


80 

Now,  if  the  provisions  of  the  first  section  of  the 
Fourteenth  Amendment  simply  forbade  State  Govern 
ments  to  do  the  things  specified  there,  and  left  it  to 
the  Federal  judiciary  to  annul  and  destroy  any  action 
of  the  State  Governments  which  was  in  defiance  of 
those  provisions,  few,  if  any  persons,  could  be  found 
to  quarrel  with  that  amendment.  Every  good  which 
could  possibly  flow  from  it  would  be  secured  to  the 
citizen,  and  the  theory  of  our  Government  of  a  Repub 
lic  of  States  would  still  be  preserved.  But  the  Repub 
lican  theory  will  demand  more.  It  will  not  be  content 
with  a  plan  which  makes  void  whatever  is  attempted 
in  contravention  of  the  Constitution.  It  will  have  Con 
gress  empowered  to  legislate  and  enforce  its  legislation 
whenever  a  blind  and  ignorant  majority  of  partisans  may 
think,  in  their  crude  considerations  of  the  nature  of 
government,  a  case  has  arisen  for  central  interference 
with  local  administration  of  affairs.  This  is  neither  more 
nor  less  than  despotism.  It  is  a  central  government 
without  limitations  upon  its  powers,  which  completely 
fulfils  the  idea  of  despotism. 

Recently  my  eye  fell  upon  the  following  admirable 
letter,  written  by  General  Bradley  T.  Johnson,  of  the 
Baltimore  (Md.)  bar,  to  the  editor  of  the  Dubuque 
(Iowa)  Herald.  It  is  full  of  such  sound  common-sense 
and  practical  statesmanship,  in  its  views  touching  the 
Southern  question,  that  I  print  it  here  in  full.  Colonel 
1).  B.  Henderson  had  made  a  speech  in  Iowa,  in  which 
he  said  what  follows  here  ;  and  the  editor  of  the  Herald 
had  inclosed  it  to  General  Johnson  to  know  if  he  was 
correctly  reported.  The  extract  and  the  letter  follow  : 


81 

Extract  from  a  speech  of  Col.  D.  B.  Henderson,  at  Waterloo,  August  ttth,  1880. 

"  In  this  connection,  although  I  do  not  desire  to  tell  stories,  I  will 
relate  an  incident  which  happened  when  I  was  down  in  Washington 
dm  ing  the  trial  of  the  Washhurne-Donnelly  case.  I  was  introduced 
to  Gen.  Johnson,  of  Baltimore,  who  was  there  defending  Donnelly. 
He  was  a  Confederate  general  of  note,  and  has  become  an  eminent 
lawyer.  Said  I  to  him,  '  General,  what  will  be  the  outcome  of  the 
Southern  question  ?  Will  the  negroes  and  white  Republicans  be 
allowed  to  vote  ?  '  Said  he,  '  I  will  be  frank  with  you,  for  it  is  time 
there  was  a  better  understanding  between  us.  I  tell  you  that  we 
intend  to  give  the  negro  his  personal,  property,  and  educational 
rights,  but  not  his  political  lights.  Tasked  what  his  personal  rights 
meant,  and  he  said  he  referred  to  his  family  relations.  I  said,  '  In 
States  where  the  negroes  are  in  a  majority,  what  will  you  do?' 
'  We  can't  allow  them  to  vote.'  '  But  suppose  they  demand  it  ?  ' 
'  We  can't  help  it  ;  they  can't  vote.'  He  then  proceeded  to  discuss 
the  question  with  me,  and  added,  '  We  have  made  up  our  minds, 
and  we  might  as  well  understand  each  other.  The  negroes  in  the 
South  cannot  exercise  their  political  rights. '  I  then  said  to  him 
that  the  book  I  had  been  reading — Judge  Toui gee's  '  Fool's  Er 
rand  ' — was  true  then.  He  said,  while  not  admitting  the  philoso 
phy  of  it,  the  statements  were  true  to  the  letter.  That,  my  friends, 
is  the  position  of  the  Democratic  party  in  the  South  to-day.  It  is 
only  another  mode  of  accomplishing  in  peace  what  they  failed  to 
accomplish  by  war." 

"  WHITE  SULPHUR  SPRINGS,  WEST  VIRGINIA,  August  28. 
"  To  the  Editor  of  the  Dubuque  Herald. 

"  Dear  Sir :  Your  letter  of  the  17lh  was  forwarded  to  me  here. 
You  inclose  what  purports  to  be  a  report  of  a  speech  said  to  have 
been  made  by  Col.  D.  B.  Henderson,  in  which  Col.  Henderson  is 
said  to  have  stated  that  I  told  him,  in  a  conversation  in  Washing 
ton,  last  spring,  that  '  We  intend  to  give  the  negro  his  personal, 
property,  and  educational  rights,  but  not  his  political  rights,'  and 
you  ask  me  to  slate  if  his  statement  is  correct.  Assuming  that 
Col.  Henderson  is  correctly  repoited,  I  have  to  say  that  he  misuii- 

4* 


82 

derstood  and  misapplied  the  conversation  I  then  had  with  him.  I 
am  not  surprised  at  this,  for  the  ideas  I  then  suggested  were  evi 
dently  new  to  him,  and  in  the  interview  between  us,  lasting  only 
a  short  time,  it  could  not  be  expected  that  a  perfect  stranger  could 
at  once  take  in  and  apply  the  suggestions  then  made  to  him  by  a 
person  unknown  to  him  before,  when  these  suggestions  were  made 
from  a  standpoint  entirely  novel  and  unexpected.  I  recollect  the 
scope  and  purpose  of  our  conversation  perfectly.  Col.  Henderson 
was  an  intelligent  Republican  from  an  extreme  Western  State,  and 
I  thought  I  could  really  be  of  service  by  imparting  to  him  what  I 
believe  to  be  the  heartfelt  purposes  of  our  Southern  ex-Confederate 
people.  I  said  that  the  question  with  us  in  the  South  was  a  social, 
fundamental  question,  not  at  all  connected  with  temporary  parti 
san  issues  which  interest  the  other  States.  Social  order,  civiliza 
tion,  property,  education,  and  progress  were  all  involved  in  our  po 
litical  action.  The  framework  of  our  society  had  been  shattered 
from  turret  to  base,  and  political  power  thrust  into  the  hands  of 
those  inexperienced  and  incompetent  to  use  it,  and  we  were  required 
to  solve  the  problem  whether  society  could  exist  when  all  the 
power  of  government  was  wielded  by  the  ignorant,  the  unedu 
cated,  and  the  inexperienced  members  of  it.  I  said  the  forces  that 
control  a  State  are  virtue,  intelligence,  property,  and  manhood, 
and  that  no  device  could  be  invented,  no  constitutional  amend 
ment,  nor  Congressional  enactment  be  applied,  which  could  change 
this  order  of  nature. 

"  When  society  is  left  to  itself,  uncontrolled  by  exterior  force, 
these  vital  forces  will  direct  and  govern  it.  Therefore,  I  said,  the 
negro  could  not  control  any  portion  of  the  Southern  States.  The 
whites  would  govern  these  States  always  and  under  all  circum 
stances,  not  because  they  are  white,  but  because  they  possess  those 
attributes  which  the  other  race  is  deficient  in.  I  said  we,  the 
whites,  would  secure  the  negro  all  his  rights  of  person  and  of 
property  ;  we  would  insure  his  education  and  development  ;  ire 
would  protect  him  from  his  own  ignorance  and  inexperience. 
Left  alone,  he  had  proved  himself  incapable  of  standing  unsup 
ported.  But,  I  said,  under  all  circumstances,  wo  will  retain  the 


83 

control  of  society  in  the  bauds  of  the  whites,  because  all  the  forces 
of  society  inhere  in  and  pertain  to  the  whites.  I  said  numerical 
majorities  of  blacks  in  localities  will  not  prevent  this.  Power  goes 
to  the  hands  that  can  use  it,  and  mere  numerical  power  never  has 
controlled  and  never  will  control  society.  Women  and  children 
make  up  the  large  majority,  but  power  is  in  the  hands  of  the  mi 
nority  of  adult  men.  Where  the  blacks  have  numerical  majorities, 
means  will  be  found  to  control  them.  Limitations  of  the  franchise 
by  property  or  educational  tests,  or  by  capitation  taxes,  or  by  di 
visions  geographical,  will  be  applied,  and  thus  the  political  power 
of  negro  majorities  will  be  destroyed  or  neutralized.  I  can  well  un 
derstand  how  Col.  Henderson  could  have  misapplied  my  remarks. 
I  was  talking  of  the  inherent,  irresistible  forces  which  control  so 
ciety,  above  constitutions,  laws,  or  political  arrangements.  He 
was  thinking  of  the  mere  voting,  and  the  devices  resorted  to  by 
which  these  forces  may  best  govern  it.  I  now  repeat,  that  under 
no  circumstances  will  any  American  State,  whether  it  be  Iowa  or 
South  Carolina,  of  its  own  free  will,  permit  itself  to  be  governed 
by  the  ignorant,  incompetent,  and  inexperienced  classes  within  it. 
If  some  future  exodus  should  flood  your  fair  State  with  Southern 
negroes  or  Eastern  Chinese,  the  Republican  and  Democratic  par 
ties  of  Iowa  would  shrivel  up  like  parchment  in  the  fire.  They 
would  cease  to  be,  and  every  white  man  in  Iowa  would  unite  in  an 
earnest  effort  to  preserve  the  civilization,  the  society,  and  the  moral 
tone  of  that  social  organization  which  has  placed  her  among  the 
foremost  of  the  American  commonwealths. 

"  Allow  me  to  make  a  further  reinaik.  If  the  Northern  Repub 
licans  could  be  got  to  understand  and  appreciate  the  real  difficulties 
of  the  Southern  question,  and  the  real  sentiments  and  aspirations  of 
the  Southern  people,  we  could  undoubtedly  all  be  enabled  to  turn 
our  attention  to  the  discussion  and  development  of  great  proposi 
tions  which  confront  us  all  alike,  and  on  which  the  future  happi 
ness  and  prosperity  of  all  alike  depend.  I  ask  them,  Put  your 
selves  in  our  place  ;  we  are  opposed  to  secession  ;  we  are  for  an 
indissoluble  Union  ;  we  will  never  consent  to  slavery  in  any  form, 
direct  or  indirect.  Now,  these  things  granted,  put  yourselves  in 


84 

our  place,  with  a  class  among  you,  sometimes  outnumbering  you, 
always  formidable  in  numbers,  on  whom  political  power  has  been 
forced  without  preparation  or  fitness — would  you  not  do  precisely 
as  we  are  doing,  and  would  not  the  white  people  of  Iowa  retain 
their  control  over  their  schools,  their  taxes,  their  courts,  their 
county  and  St&te  governments  ?  AVould  not  their  wit,  their  intel 
ligence,  their  power  of  organization,  more  than  counterbalance 
mere  numbers  ?  I  take  it  that  the  anti-Chinese  plank  of  the  Chi 
cago  platform,  for  which,  doubtless,  Col.  Henderson  vcted,  is  a 
public  confession  by  the  Republican  party  that  its  dogma  of  race 
equality  is  false,  and  a  public  retraction  of  all  its  old  errors  on 
that  article  of  its  faith.  No  man  can  assert  that  the  Chinaman, 
with  his  four  thousand  years  of  civilization,  is  not  more  fit  for  the 
duties  of  American  citizenship  than  the  Southern  negro.  I  assert 
that  the  South  is  as  thoroughly  union  and  anti-slavery,  to-day,  as 
Iowa  or  New  England.  Emancipation  has  brought  to  her  ma 
terial  development,  of  which  you  now  only  see  the  dawn.  The 
largest  crop  of  slave-grown  cotton  was  five  million  bales  ;  this  year 
our  crop  will  be  six  and  a  quarter  millions.  The  cost  of  cotton  to 
the  Massachusetts  manufacturer  is  18  per  cent  greater  than  to  the 
South  Carolina  or  Georgia  manufacturer.  This  difference  in  prime 
cost  has  quadrupled  the  factories  in  the  South,  while  New  Eng 
land  languishes,  and  the  spindles  of  Lowell  and  Fall  River  are- 
even  now  in  movement  to  Columbia  and  Augusta.  Some  of  the 
States  and  many  of  our  cities  exempt  manufacturers  from  taxation 
for  terms  of  years,  and  the  next  census  will  show  results  which 
you  would  now  deem  incredible. 

"  The  late  Confederate  Slates  are  larger  by  100,000  square  miles 
than  all  the  free  States  east  of  the  Rocky  Mountains,  and  there  ia 
more  public  land  subject  to  entry  in  many  of  them  than  in  any  of 
your  Western  States.  Florida  is  as  large  as  New  York,  New  Jersey, 
and  Connecticut.  Texas  is  as  large  as  all  New  England,  New  York, 
New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  and  Ohio.  We  are  trying  to  settle  these 
great  States,  to  develop  their  imperial  resources  ;  we  have  climate, 
area,  and  a  productive  soil.  We  want  men  and  money,  population 
and  capital.  To  get  them  we  require  peace  and  order.  We  can 


85 

secure  them  only  in  the  Union  and  of  the  Union.  Its  power,  its 
prestige,  its  boundless  resources  are  ten  times  more  necessary  for 
us  than  for  the  opulent  and  populous  States.  Therefore,  we  are 
resolved  to  support  and  maintain  the  Union  forever,  under  every 
contingency,  against  all  attacks,  whether  from  within  or  without. 
Our  policy  is  peace  and  union.  They  are  the  necessities  of  our 
being  and  progress.  Our  aspirations  are  for  railroads,  telegraphs, 
printing-presses,  and  school-houses.  They  are  toward  commerce 
and  trade,  the  arts,  the  sciences,  and  literature.  Every  energy 
and  all  our  thoughts  will  be  directed  for  several  generations  tow 
ard  development,  material  and  intellectual,  toward  progress  and 
a  higher  culture  under  one  government  with  fiee  and  liberal  insti 
tutions.  We  will  maintain  the  Constitution  and  all  its  amend 
ments,  because  we  intend  that  all  parts  of  the  country  shall  be 
open  to  all  American  citizens  with  equality  of  rights,  and  that  no 
future  party  shall  arise  to  prohibit  negro  emigration  to  any  State, 
as  the  Republican  party  has  just  prohibited  Chinese  emigration  to 
all  the  States.  We  do  not  intend  to  have  the  blacks  cooped  up 
and  fenced  in  the  States  where  they  now  congregate.  Our  policy 
extends  far  beyond  the  mere  temporary  partisan  issues.  There  is 
no  South  and  North,  there  may  hereafter  be  an  East  and  West. 
But  when  the  farmer  of  the  great  West  gets  to  understand  that 
down  the  Mississippi  Valley  lie  lands  which  may  be  had  for  the 
asking,  whose  fertility  is  such  that  a  laborer  in  agriculture  can  pro 
duce  from  six  hundred  to  a  thousand  dollars  pur  capita,  net,  per 
annum,  you  will  see  such  a  movement  of  population  that  in  the 
next  ten  years  will  work  miracles.  As  this  movement  of  free  in 
stitutions  and  free  labor  goes  on,  the  world  will  witness  the  devel 
opment  of  a  great  people  and  a  great  empire. 

"  The  commerce  of  tbe  world  lies  within  our  grasp.  Mexico, 
South  America,  the  new-found  continent  of  Africa,  all  require  our 
products  of  cotton  and  tobacco,  of  our  mines  and  our  great  fac 
tories.  The  American  flag  now  is  as  unknown  in  these  seas  as  that 
of  the  republic  of  San  Marino.  Norwegian  ships  come  up  the 
James  River  and  carry  off  Virginia  freights.  Italian  vessels, 
Dutch  skippers,  and  English  steamers  engross  the  trade  of  Charles- 


86 

ton,  Savannah,  and  New  Orleans.  The  policy  and  laws  of  the 
Government  for  the  last  twenty  years  have  destroyed  the  Ameri 
can  mercantile  marine.  We  will  repeal  the  laws  which  have  pro 
duced  these  results.  We  will  puichase  ships  on  the  Clyde  or  the 
Delaware,  or  wherever  we  can  buy  them  best,  and  we  will  carry 
on  our  own  commerce  in  our  ships,  under  our  own  flag,  and  that 
flag  shall  be  the  Stars  and  Stripes.  I  have  taken  some  space  to  an 
swer  your  simple  inquiry,  but  I  have  tried,  in  doing  so,  to  put  in 
a  clear  light  the  real  questions  which  interest  you  and  us.  I  have 
tried  to  show  that  we  have  a  deeper,  wider,  larger  interest  than 
you,  in  maintaining  the  Union  with  the  Constitution  as  amended  ; 
that  our  necessity  for  peace  and  union  is  greater  than  yours,  and 
that  we  are  intent  on  preserving  the  one  and  maintaining  the 
other.  When  we  get  this  understood  we  can  unite  in  the  exami 
nation  of  economical  problems  and  of  systems  of  taxation  and 
finance,  of  policies  of  commerce,  and  of  social  laws,  and  remit  the 
consideration  of  the  rebels  and  the  Ku-klux  to  those  who  go  on 
1  fools'  errands,'  and  then  vex  the  public  by  their  clatter  in  telling 
about  them.  Yours  respectfully, 

"  BRADLEY  T.  JOHNSON." 


87 

ADDENDUM. 


Itf  October,  1880,  the  New  York  Sun  called  attention 
to  the  report  of  the  "  Frauds  Commission/'  and  invoked 
Mr.  Tourgee's  attention  to  it.  Whilst  this  work  was 
going  through  the  press  my  attention  was  called  to  a 
letter  from  A.  W.  Tourgee  to  the  New  York  Sun,  in  the 
columns  of  that  journal  for  December  9,  in  which  he 
gives  an  explanation  of  his  connection  with  -these  mat 
ters.  I  will  allow  him  to  state  that  explanation  here 
in  his  own  words.  In  his  letter  to  the  Sun  he  says  : 

"  Mr.  Swepson  says  that  he  paid  these  sums  to  me  at  the  request 
of  Mr.  Littlefield.  I  know  nothing  of  any  arrangement  between 
them  or  of  the  fund  to  which  it  is  charged,  except  what  there  ap 
pears.  The  following  are  the  facts  in  relation  to  the  two  sums 
named  : 

"  In  the  spring  of  1868,  as  one  of  the  secretaries  of  the  Republi 
can  Slate  Committee,  I  was  directed  by  Mr.  Swepson  to  draw  on 
him  for  a  certain  sum  for  campaign  expenses.  Accordingly,  some 
time  early  in  April,  the  election  being  on  the  20th  of  that  month, 
having  need  of  that  sum  to  pay  the  expenses  of  certain  speakers, 
I  drew  on  Mr.  Swepson  for  $300.  This  draft  was  protested.  I 
did  not  learn  of  the  protest  until  some  time  afterward,  and  then 
wrote  to  Mr.  Swepson  in  regard  to  it,  and  it  was  paid.  I  have  no 
idea  why  it  was  charged  to  Littlefield,  as  I  never  had  any  commu 
nication  with  him  in  regard  to  the  matter,  and  did  not  know  that 
he  had  any  knowledge  of  it  until  I  read  the  testimony  of  Mr. 
Swepson. 

"  The  second  was  in  this  wise  :  In  June  or  July,  1869,  I  learned 
that  a  piece  of  property  I  was  very  anxious  to  have  would  be  sold 


for  cash.  Not  having  the  money,  I  went  to  the  owner,  Mr.  J.  A. 
Gray,  a  prominent  banker  and  active  Democrat  of  Greensboro, 
N.  C.,  where  I  have  resided  ever  since  the  war,  and  obtained  the 
refusal  of  the  property  fora  few  days,  telling  him  that  I  would  try 
to  borrow  the  money  from  Mr.  Swepson.  Mr.  Swepsnn  had 
been  my  first  client  after  going  to  North  Carolina,  and  I  had  had 
some  other  business  relations  with  him  before  my  election  to  the 
bench  in  the  spring  of  1868.  He  had  once  intimated  that  he 
would  lend  me  the  money  to  buy  this  property.  I  went  to  Ra 
leigh,  and  there  learned  that  Mr.  Swepsoa  was  in  New  York. 
Happening  to  see  Mr.  Littlefield,  I  mentioned  my  disappointment 
and  my  fear  that  I  would  lose  the  property.  He  at  once  said  he 
would  arrange  it  for  me.  He  therefore  took  my  notes,  payable 
semi-anuually  in  alternate  sums  of  $400  and  $000,  to  meet  my  pros 
pective  means  of  payment,  with  interest  at  8  per  cent,  and  gave 
me  a  sight  draft  ou  Mr.  Swepson  for  the  amount  required,  $3500. 
He  said  he  had  no  doubt  that  Mr.  Swepson  would  be  willing  to 
lend  me  the  money,  and  he  would  indorse  the  notes  to  him.  I  told 
him  I  would  secure  them  by  moitgage  on  the  property.  Accord 
ingly  the  notes  were  not  stamped,  but  marked  according  to  the 
law  as  it  then  was  :  '  To  be  secured  by  mortgage  of  real  estate  duly 
stamped.'  Mr.  Littlefield  said  he  would  let  me  know  in  whose 
favor  Swepson  desired  the  mortgage  to  be  drawn.  As  the  notes 
were  negotiable  and  the  check  was  not  money,  a  memorandum  of 
the  transaction  was  made  and  signed  and  witnessed  by  a  gentle 
man  who  was  present.  It  is  still  in  my  possession.  I  returned  to 
Greensboro,  assigned  Littlefield 's  draft  on  Swepson  to  Mr.  Gray, 
directed  the  deed  to  be  made  out,  and  went  off  on  my  circuit. 
On  my  return  Mr.  Gray  told  me  the  draft  had  been  protested.  1 
wrote  to  Littlefield  for  the  return  of  my  notes.  The  reply  was  a 
note  from  Swepson  to  send  on  the  draft,  which  was  done,  and  he 
paid  it,  also  the  protest  fees.  Some  time  afterwards  I  saw  Mr. 
Littlefield,  and  told  him  I  was  ready  to  execute  the  mortgage.  He 
said  that  Swepson  had  refused  to  loan  the  money  on  such  long 
lime,  and  he  had  been  compelled  to  arrange  for  the  payment  of  the 
draft  himself,  but  he  hoped  Swepson  would  lake  the  notes  when 


89 

they  came  to  a  settlement,  and  then  the  mortgage  could  be  made 
to  him.  These  notes  were  given  in  good  faith,  and  I  considered 
them  bonafide  debts.  The  transaction  was  an  open  one,  known 
to  a  dozen  or  more  parties,  and  made  without  any  attempt  at  con 
cealment. 

"  1  was  afterwards  served  with  a  garnishment  by  creditors  of 
Littlefield,  suing  in  the  Superior  Court  of  Wake  County,  and  made 
answer  admitting  the  indebtedness,  which  I  had  never  denied  or 
concealed.  Pending  this  litigation  came  the  commercial  panic 
of  1873.  Being  largely  engaged  in  manufacturing,  I  was  caught 
short,  and,  to  secure  my  creditors,  mortgaged  all  my  property, 
which  was  insufficient  to  meet  the  liabilities  of  my  business.  In 
consequence  of  this,  I  suppose,  the  garnishment  was  not  pressed. 
Some  years  afterward,  when  their  collection  had  been  barred  by 
limitations,  the  notes  were  surrendered  to  me  by  Mr.  Swepson." 

Upon  this  the  Sun  made  the  following  delicious  com 
ments  in  its  editorial  columns  : 

"  His  explanation  of  the  second  entry,  $3,502.55,  is  less  simple. 
An  alleged  business  transaction  of  rather  complicated  nature  is 
involved.  Mr.  Tourgee's  narrative  of  the  alleged  facts  must  be 
carefully  perused  in  order  to  understand  (he  defence  at  all.  To 
the  best  of  our  comprehension,  it  is  admitted  by  Mr.  Tourgee  that 
he  received  $3500  which  ultimately  came  from  Swepson,  through 
Littlefield's  friendly  offices,  and  that  this  alleged  loan  was  never 
repaid  by  himself. 

"  The  objection  that  will  probably  be  made  to  both  of  these  ex 
planations,  as  answers  to  the  charge,  is  that  much  more  rounda 
bout  methods  have  before  this  been  used  by  clever  men  to  cover 
corrupt  dealings.  If  Mr.  Tourgee  were  able  to  show  that  he  ever, 
in  any  form,  repaid  the  alleged  loan  of  $3500,  the  case  would  be 
different. 

"  On  the  other  hand,  the  theory  of  Mr.  Tourgee's  innocence  of 
wrong  doing  is  not  wholly  inconsistent  with  the  proved  facts.  We 
are  glad  to  put  special  emphasis  on  this  point.  To  make  tlie  the- 


90 

ory  of  innocence  accord  with  the  admitted  facts,  however,  it  is 
necessary  to  allow  for  a  series  of  coincidences  of  an  extraordinary 
character.  Mr.  Tourgee  wants  to  borrow  money  to  buy  some 
laud.  He  thinks  of  applying  to  Mr.  Swepson,  who  happened  to 
be  his  political  and  personal  friend.  Mr.  Swepson  happens  at  this 
time  to  be  spending  hundreds  of  thousands  of  dollars  for  the  pur 
chase  of  politicians.  Mr.  Tourgee  happens  to  mention  his  desire 
to  Mr.  Littlefield,  a  notorious  and  professional  eorruptionist,  who 
happens  to  be  Mr.  Swepson's  agent  in  the  purchase  of  State  offi 
cials.  Mr.  Littlefield  happens  to  be  in  a  mood  which  leads  him 
to  undertake  to  arrange  Mr.  Tourgee's  business  with  Mr.  Tourgee's 
personal  friend  Swepson.  Mr.  Tourgee  happens  to  be  undergoing 
a  phase  of  folly  which  inclines  him  to  accept  the  offer  of  this  no 
torious  person.  Between  Swepson  and  Littlefield  the  money  is 
found  for  Mr.  Tourgee,  who  profits  by  it.  Business  emlmna  s- 
ments  happen,  which  prevent  Mr.  Tourgee  from  repaying  the  ob 
ligation.  And  finally,  through  the  most  unfoi  Innate  of  a  long 
train  of  unfortunate  circumstances,  the  transaction,  by  an  unac 
countable  mistake,  gets  recorded  in  the  private  corruption  account 
kept  between  Swepson  and  Littlefield." 

But  the  transaction  will  bear  even  closer  inspection 
than  the  Sun  has  given  it. 

The  substance  of  it  is  this  :  Tourgee,  wanting  f3500, 
mentions  that  fact  casually  to  Littlefield.  Littlefield 
says  he  shall  have  the  money  ;  that  he  (Littlefield) 
will  draw  a  draft  for  the  amount  on  Swepson.  Tourgee 
says,  If  you  will,  I  will  give  my  notes  for  it,  which  I 
will  secure  by  a  deed  of  trust  on  the  property  that  I 
am  going  to  pay  for  with  it.  All  right,  says  Littlefield, 
and  he  draws  his  draft  on  Swepson  for  $3500,  payable 
to  the  order  of  Tourgee,  and  Tourgee  takes  this  draft 
and  gives  it  to  Gray  in  payment  for  the  property. 


91 

The  draft  comes  back  protested.  Tourgee  reports  that* 
fact  to  Littlefield,  and  Littlefield  answers  with  a  note 
from  Swepson,  directing  the  draft  to  be  forwarded, 
which  is  done,  and  he  pays  it.  Some  time  afterwards 
Tourgee  meets  Littlefield,  and  tells  him  he  is  ready  to 
execute  that  deed  to  secure  Swepson  payment  of  the 
notes  which  he  supposed  Littlefield  had  transferred  to 
him,  whereupon  Littlefield  tells  him  that  Swepson  would 
not  take  the  notes,  and  that  he,  Littlefield,  had  been 
compelled  to  raise  the  money  for  him,  and  that  the 
debt  is  due  by  Tourgee  to  himself.  Further  discussion 
as  to  securing  the  debt  by  a  deed  of  trust  seems  to 
have  been  abandoned,  Littlefield  being  content  to 
waive  that,  and  being  satisfied  with  Tourgee's  personal 
obligation.  In  time  Littlefield  fails,  and  Tourgee  fails, 
and  by  some  process  left  wholly  unexplained,  Little- 
field  transfers  Tourgee's  notes  to  Swepson.  When  we 
next  hear  of  the  notes  they  are  brought  by  Swepson  to 
Tourgee,  and  surrendered  to  him  without  consideration. 
Now,  the  first  inquiry  that  naturally  strikes  the 
mind  is,  Why  should  Littlefield,  upon  whom  Tourgee 
had  no  claims,  have  volunteered  to  draw  his  draft  for 
Tourgee's  benefit,  for  so  large  a  sum  as  $3500  ?  A 
letter  to  Swepson,  urging  him  to  let  Tourgee  have  the 
money,  would  have  done  all  that  a  draft  could  do. 
Why  should  he  have  thus  become  Tourgee's  indorser  ? 
Secondly,  if  he  were  going  to  do  so  disinterested  a 
thing,  as  we  are  bound  on  Tourgee's  statement  to  be 
lieve  that  he  did,  why  should  he  have  drawn  his  draft 
on  a  person  in  whose  hands  he  had  no  funds  ?  Swep- 


92 

son's  refusal  to  pay  the  draft  was  proof  that  Little- 
field  had  no  funds  in  his  hands.  And  third,  as  he  was 
going  to  do  so  liberal  and  disinterested  a  thing,  why, 
of  all  men  in  the  world,  should  he  have  selected  Swep- 
son,  with  whom,  he  had  his  corrupt  bargain  for  brib 
ing  the  Legislature,  as  the  man  to  draw  on  ?  The  next 
thing  that  arrests  attention  is  this  :  Why  should  Little- 
field  have  been  "  compelled  to  arrange  for  the  payment 
of  the  draft  himself?"  Tourgee  had  no  claims  of  any 
sort  whatever  on  Littlefield.  Littlefield  had  simply 
volunteered,  out  of  pure  and  simple  friendship,  to  help 
him  forward  in  getting  a  loan  from  Swepson,  When 
the  draft  came  back  protested,  Littlefield's  course  was 
to  say  to  Tourgee,  "  Well,  old  fellow,  I've  done  all  I 
could  to  enable  you  to  get  a  loan  from  Swepson,  but  it 
seems  that  he  won't  lend.  I'm  sorry  for  you  ;  you  must 
arrange  the  matter  with  Gray."  He  was  not  "com 
pelled"  to  make  any  arrangements  to  take  the  draft  up, 
unless  Gray  demanded  it,  and  it  is  not  averred  that  he 
did.  No  money  had  been  obtained  on  it ;  it  had  sim 
ply  been  assigned  to  Gray  to  be  payment  for  his  prop 
erty,  in  case  Swepson  honored  it  ;  to  be  nothing  in  case 
he  did  not.  Gray,  in  the  mean  time,  held  on  to  his 
property,  so  that  he  was  not  damaged  by  Swepson's 
refusal  to  pay,  except  to  the  extent  of  the  loss  of  a 
sale.  Littlefield,  therefore,  was  under  no  obligation, 
except  obligations  to  Tourgee,  the  consideration  of 
which,  Tourgee  best  knows,  to  take  up  the  draft  when 
it  came  back  protested,  and  pay  the  amount  of  it  to 
Gray,  in  the  absence  of  any  demand  by  Gray. 


93 

Next,  why  should  Swepson,  after  Tourgee's  notes 
came  to  be  his  property,  have  made  Tourgee  a  present 
of  them  ?  The  impression  is  sought  to  be  made,  that 
Littlefield  passed  them  off  to  Swepson  in  payment  of 
money  that  he  owed  him.  If  so,  then  Tourgee  became 
Swepson 's  debtor  to  the  amount  of  the  notes.  Why 
should  Swepson  have  released  him  from  the  debt  with 
out  consideration  ?  Mr.  Tourgee  suggests  the  idea 
that  they  were  barred  by  the  statute  of  limitations, 
and  that  Swepson  made  him  a  present  of  them  be 
cause  they  had  become  worthless.  Fie,  Mr.  Tourgee  ! 
Would  you  have  us  believe  that  your  character,  among 
your  friends,  was  at  so  low  an  ebb  that  they  looked 
upon  a  bona  fide  debt  due  by  you,  but  barred  by  the 
statute  of  limitations,  as  utterly  worthless— as  no  bet 
ter  than  old  rags,  or  not  so  good  ?  You,  too,  who  con 
tained  in  yourself  an  embodiment  of  the  great  ' '  moral 
ideas"  party,  and  who,  from  pure  conviction  of  duty 
alone,  had  taken  upon  yourself  the  missionary  obliga 
tion  of  saving  and  regenerating  the  barbarous  people 
of  North  Carolina.  But,  aside  from  this  view,  so  de 
rogatory  to  Mr.  Tourgee,  let  us  consider  for  a  moment 
how  Swepson  would  have  viewed  it.  We  all  know  that 
in  practical  life  creditors  do  not  surrender  to  their 
debtors  evidences  of  debt,  because  they  may  happen 
to  be  barred  by  the  statute  of  limitations.  They  hold 
on  to  them  in  the  hope  that  something  may  turn  up, 
through  which  they  may  realize  something.  But 
supposing  the  notes  were  barred,  still  Swepson  would 
not  have  surrendered  them  without  consideration, 


94 

unless  he  had  been  a  fool.  When  the  notes  were 
given,  it  was  with  an  agreement  written  out  on  the 
face  of  the  notes,  that  they  should  be  secured  by  a 
deed  of  trust.  Now,  though  the  statute  might  have 
run  against  the  notes,  yet  it  would  not  have  run 
against  the  deed,  which  would,  under  the  laws  of  most 
States,  have  taken  the  notes  under  its  protection. 
City  of  Kenoslia  v.  Lamson,  9  Wallace  ;  City  of  Lexing 
ton  v.  Butler,  14  Wallace.  I  do  not  mean  to  express 
an  opinion,  that  Swepson,  by  bringing  a  suit  in  equity 
to  compel  Tourgee  to  execute  the  deed  of  trust,  could 
have  thus  cut  him  out  of  his  plea  of  the  statute  ;  but 
I  do  mean  to  say,  that  ninety-nine  lawj^ers  out  of  every 
hundred  to  whom  he  might  have  applied  for  advice, 
would  have  told  him  that  there  was  too  much  show  for 
his  winning,  for  him  to  throw  away  his  notes. 

Finally,  why  should  Svvepson  have  charged  this 
money  in  the  corruption  account  between  himself  and 
Littlefield — and  charged  it,  too,  at  the  very  moment 
when  it  was  advanced  ?  It  is  not  suggested  that  he 
was  an  enemy  to  Tourgee,  and  inspired  by  a  desire  to 
injure  him  ;  on  the  contrary,  Tourgee  represents  him 
to  have  been  his  friend.  Yet,  if  it  did  not  belong  to 
the  corruption  account,  it  is  difficult  to  conceive  of  any 
other  inspiration  that  could  have  induced  him  to  put 
it  there. 

The  memorandum  of  the  transaction  that  was  made 
by  Tourgee  at  the  time,  and  signed  by  a  witness,  is  not 
entitled  to  a  feather's  weight.  If  the  transaction  was 
intended  as  a  device  for  concealing  a  payment  for 


95 

lobby  services,  just  some  such  trick  as  this  would  have 
been  resorted  to,  to  conceal  the  matter.  If  the  thing 
had  been  perfectly  fair,  and  such  a  matter  as  was  fit  for 
the  light  of  day,  the  chances  would  have  been  against 
the  making  of  any  such  memorandum  to  be  signed  by 
a  witness.  It  would  have  been  wholly  unnecessary, 
and  would  necessarily  have  been  an  indication  of  distrust 
of  Littlefield. 

He  (Littlefield)  had  acted  in  the  matter  nothing  but 
the  part  of  a  disinterested  friend,  involving  his  credit 
to  a  certain  extent  for  his  friend,  without  consider 
ation  ;  and  after  his  friendly  interposition,  for  Tourgee 
to  have  turned  on  him  and  said,  "  We  must  have  all 
this  in  writing  and  witnessed,"  would  have  been  a  poor 
return  to  make  him. 

Mr.  Tourgee  will  have  to  make  a  very  different  ex 
planation  from  that  which  he  has  made,  before  the 
public  will  believe  that  he  has  disconnected  himself 
from  Swepson  and  Littlefield  and  their  corrupt  ar 
rangement.  The  multitude  of  disconnected  facts  upon 
which  his  explanation  is  made  to  turn,  reminds  one  of 
Artemus  Ward's  reply  to  the  Mormon  ladies  :  "  Yes, 
ladies,  it  is  the  muchness  of  the  thing  that  I  object  to." 
The  "muchness"  of.  Mr.  Tourgee's  explanation  will  be 
sure  to  arrest  attention. 


97 


REJOINDER     TO    TOURGEE'S    REVIEW    AND 
ANSWER  IN  THE   NEW  YORK   TRIBUNE. 


ON  the  31st  of  January,  1881,  the  New  York  Tribune 
published  a  communication  from  A.  W.  Tourgee,  four 
columns  in  length,  reviewing  and  answering  the  preced 
ing  pages  of  this  reply.  It  was  full  of  misrepresenta 
tions,  all  made  with  a  view  to  bolstering  up  the  previous 
misrepresentations  contained  in  "A  Fool's  Errand." 
As  soon  as  I  could,  I  prepared  a  Rejoinder  to  that,  ex 
posing  Mr.  Tourgee's  attempted  frauds,  which  I  sent 
to  the  Tribune,  claiming,  as  a  matter  of  simple  justice, 
that  it  should  allow  the  other  side  to  be  heard,  after  pub 
lishing  Mr.  Tourgee's  injurious  statements.  My  article 
would  have  made  about — possibly  a  little  more  than — 
five  columns.  It  was  substantially  what  the  following 
pages  contain,  though  I  have  added  to  it  since  what 
would  make  possibly  two  columns  and  a  half  of  the 
Tribune.  The  Tribune  refused  to  publish  my  Re 
joinder,  upon  the  ground  that  it  could  not  afford  the 
space.  It  held  out  a  hope  that  it  might  possibly  pub 
lish  it  if  I  would  reduce  it  to  what  would  make  about  a 
column  and  a  half.  I  should  have  been  perfectly  will 
ing  to  strike  out  of  my  Rejoinder  whatever  was  simply 
comment  and  remark  ;  but  Mr.  Tourgee's  article  had 
challenged  the  truth  of  my  general  propositions,  and  it 
was  therefore  necessary  that  I  should  produce  the  evi 
dence  somewhat  in  detail  that  would  prove  them.  If  I 

5 


did  this  I  would  be  accomplishing  something  of  value  ; 
it  would  have  been  better  to  leave  matters  as  they  were 
than  to  do  less.  No  candid  person  can  read  the  follow 
ing  pages  and  say  that  the  material  contained  in  them 
could  be  put  into  two  columns  of  the  Tribune  so  as  to 
be  of  any  value  whatever.  The  controversy  is  over  mat 
ters  of  fact,  and  to  form  an  enlightened  judgment  on 
questions  of  disputed  fact  it  is  necessary  to  hear  the 
evidence.  The  evidence  cannot  be  curtailed  without 
making  it  incomplete,  and  to  state  it  fully  requires 
more  space  than  two  columns. 

The  Tribune  had  voluntarily  permitted  its  columns 
to  be  brought  into  this  controversy.  With  nothing  call 
ing  for  it  except  a  supposed  desire  to  have  the  truth 
known,  it  had  permitted  Mr.  Tourgee  to  use  four  of  its 
columns  to  make  further  misrepresentations  in  aid  of 
his  previous  slanders.  If  it  could  not  afford  space  to  a 
full  discussion  of  the  subject,  it  should  have  reflected 
upon  that  fact  before  it  permitted  Tourgee  to  make  it 
an  instrument  for  a  fraud  upon  the  public.  But  hav 
ing  allowed  him,  through  its  columns,  to  do  an  injury 
to  defenceless  people,  it  owed  it  to  them,  and  it  owed  it 
to  itself,  to  allow  those  people  to  show  through  the  same 
medium  that  they  had  been  slandered  and  wronged  ;  or 
else  it  had  as  well  have  prepared  itself  for  the  judgment 
which  candid  men  must  have  for  its  course. 

It  has  heretofore  been  thought  that  the  Tribune  was 
a  partisan  journal,  but  many  persons  have  been  unwill 
ing  to  believe  that  it  would  wilfully  and  knowingly 
misrepresent  to  another's  injury.  I  express  no  opinion 


99 

now  upon  this  point,  but  I  will  say  that  ordinary  fair 
ness  would  seem  to  have  demanded  of  the  Tribune  that 
it  should  have  allowed  the  use  of  its  columns  in  a 
reasonable  way  to  people  who  claimed  that  it  had  allowed 
those  columns  to  be  made  a  vehicle  for  slandering  and 
injuring  them. 

To  the  Editor  of  the  Tribune. 

SIK  :  About  the  beginning  of  January,  E.  J.  Hale 
&  Son  of  New  York  City  published  for  me  a  Reply  to 
"  A  Fool's  Errand,  by  one  of  the  Fools."  In  the 
Tribune  for  January  31st  there  is  a  four-column  com 
munication  from  A.  W.  Tourgee,  the  author  of  "  A 
Fool's  Errand,"  reviewing  and  replying  to  my  work, 
to  which  I  propose  now  to  make  a  Rejoinder.  Mr. 
Tourgee' s  communication  has  reduced  the  issue  be 
tween  us  to  a  very  narrow  point,  and  on  that  issue  I 
confidently  believe  I  shall  receive  from  the  public  a  ver 
dict,  as  the  result  of  overwhelming  and  crushing  evi 
dence  that  I  shall  now  adduce.  In  order  that  we  may 
know  just  what  the  question  is  that  we  are  to  try,  I 
shall  ask  the  indulgence  of  your  readers  while  I  give 
some  account  of  the  controversy. 

In  "A  Fool's  Errand  "  Mr.  Tourgee  has  undertaken 
to  paint  a  portrait  of  life  and  manners  in  the  Southern 
States  of  this  Union.  He  has  represented  that  during 
a  number  of  years  since  the  war  the  entire  body  of 
white  people  in  those  States  who  sympathized  with  the 
Confederacy  were  leagued  together  in  a  conspiracy  to 
murder  and  exterminate  the  negro  population  of  those 


100 

States.  He  represents  that  they  were  and  are  actuated 
by  a  bitter,  savage,  and  unyielding  hatred  of  the  negro, 
viewed  as  a  member  of  society  ;  and  the  lesson  which  he 
would  draw  is  that  the  Central  Government  must  pro 
tect  the  negro  from  his  old  master,  or  that  old  master 
will  inflict  upon  him  torture  more  cruel  than  the 
Comanche  visits  upon  his  victim,  and  finally  exter 
minate  him.  He  has  very  graphically  narrated  the 
details  of  many  murders  and  outrages  most  foul,  and 
he  would  have  the  world  believe  that  such  things  are  of 
daily  occurrence,  and  are  applauded  by  the  entire  white 
population  that  were  in  sympathy  with  the  Con 
federacy.  He  has  represented  also  that  those  people 
extend  their  sentiments  of  malignant  hatred  to  all  per 
sons  of  Northern  birth. 

I  have  replied  to  this,  denying  all  his  charges  in  gen 
eral,  and  in  detail  so  far  as  he  would  seek  to  make  his 
details  sustain  his  general  propositions.  I  have  admit 
ted,  what  no  candid  Southerner  will  deny,  that  during 
what  is  known  as  the  peiiod  of  Reconstruction,  in  all 
the  Southern  States  there  was  violence,  bloodshed,  and 
outrage  ;  but  I  have  undertaken  to  prove  that  that  vio 
lence  and  outrage  was  the  natural  and  inevitable  result 
of  the  condition  of  things  which  the  General  Govern 
ment  forced  upon  those  States  during  that  period.  1 
have  endeavored  to  give  a  true  and  exact  picture  of  the 
condition  of  things  in  those  States  during  that  time, 
the  main  features  of  which  I  will  here  repeat. 

With  the  exception  of  a  small  portion  of  the  moun 
tainous  region  of  the  South,  the  entire  white  population 


101     iA 

of  the  Confederate  States  were^deefj; 
sympathizers  with  the  cause  of  the  Confederacy:" ' 
people  of  the  North  will  not  believe  this,  and  yet  it  is 
as  true  as  the  Gospel  itself.  After  the  first  battle  of 
Manassas  there  were  not  twenty-five  white  persons  in 
any  Southern  State  who  did  not  sympathize  heart  and 
soul  with  the  Confederacy.  Let  him  who  maintains  the 
contrary  of  this  name  the  individuals  in  excess  of 
twenty-five  in  any  State,  and  I  will  undertake  to  prove 
what  I  say. 

This  white  population  were  terribly  in  earnest  in  their 
fight.  They  were  conscientious.  They  believed  that 
they  were  fighting  for  the  right,  and  they  cheerfully 
staked  everything  that  they  had  on  earth  upon  the  re 
sult  ;  and  what  I  am  now  going  to  say  the  Northern 
people  likewise  will  not  believe,  and  yet  it  is  equally 
true — to  wit  :  When  they  made  their  fight  and  were 
beaten,  they  surrendered  and  abandoned  their  cause 
without  reserve.  They  considered  the  surrender  of 
their  arms  as  a  seal  to  the  following  compact  :  That  no 
party  to  the  Union  should  ever  again  assert  a  claim  to  a 
right  of  secession,  and  that  slavery  should  forever  be  at 
an  end. 

The  best  possible  proof  of  this  is  the  testimony  volun 
tarily  furnished  by  General  U.  S.  Grant. 

In  1865,  very  soon  after  the  war  was  ended,  he 
made  a  tour  through  the  Southern  States,  and  this 
was  his  report  to  the  President  of  what  he  learned  and 
saw  : 


ARMIES  OP  THE  UNITED  STATES, 

" e  *'" WASHINGTON,  D.  C.,  Dec.  18,  1865. 

"  To  His  Excellency  ANDREW  JOHNSON, 

President  of  the  United  States. 

*'  SIR  :  In  reply  to  your  note  of  the  IGth  inst.,  requesting  a 
report  from  me  giving  such  information  as  I  may  be  possessed  of, 
coming  within  the  scope  of  the  inquiries  made  by  the  Senate  of 
the  United  States  in  their  resolution  of  the  12th  inst.,  I  have  the 
honor  to  submit  the  following  : 

"With  your  approval,  and  also  that  of  the  honorable  Secretary 
of  War,  I  left  Washington  City  on  the  27th  of  last  month  for  the 
purpose  of  making  a  tour  of  inspection  through  some  of  the  South 
ern  States,  or  States  lately  in  rebellion,  and  to  see  what  changes 
were  necessary  to  be  made  in  the  disposition  of  the  military  forces 
of  the  country  ;  how  these  forces  could  be  reduced  and  expenses 
curtailed,  etc.,  etc.,  and  to  learn,  as  far  as  possible,  the  feelings 
and  intentions  of  the  citizens  of  these  States  toward  the  General 
Government. 

"Both  in  travelling  and  while  stopping,  1  saw  much  and  con 
versed  freely  with  the  citizens  of  those  States,  as  well  as  with 
officers  of  the  army  who  have  been  stationed  among  them.  The 
following  are  the  conclusions  come  to  by  me  : 

"  I  am  satisfied  that  the  mass  of  the  thinking  men  of  the  South 
accept  the  present  situation  of  affairs  in  good  faith.  The  ques 
tions  which  have  heretofore  divided  the  sentiment  of  the  people 
of  the  two  sections — slavery  and  State  rights,  or  the  right  of  a 
State  to  secede  from  the  Union — they  regard  as  having  been  settled 
forever  by  the  highest  tribunal — arms— that  man  can  resort  to. 

"  I  was  pleased  to  learn  from  the  leading  men  whom  1  met  that 
they  not  only  accepted  the  decision  arrived  at  as  final,  but,  now 
the  smoke  of  battle  has  cleared  away,  and  time  has  been  given  for 
reflection,  that  this  decision  has  been  a  fortunate  one  for  the 
whole  country,  they  receiving  like  benefits  from  it  with  those 
who  opposed  them  in  the  field  and  council. 

"  The  presence  of  black  troops,  lately  slaves,  demoralizes  labor, 


103 

both  by  their  ad  rice  and  by  furnishing  in  their  camps  a  resort  for 
the  freedmen  for  long  distances  around.  White  troops  generally 
excite  no  opposition,  and  therefore  a  small  number  of  them  can 
maintain  order  in  a  given  district.  Colored  troops  must  be  kept 
in  bodies  sufficient  to  defend  themselves.  It  is  not  the  thinking- 
men  who  would  use  violence  toward  any  class  of  troops  sent 
among  them  by  the  General  Government,  but  the  ignorant  in 
some  places  might  ;  and  the  late  slave  seems  to  be  imbued  with 
the  idea  that  the  property  of  his  late  master  should  by  right  be 
long  to  him,  or  at  least  should  have  no  protection  from  the  colored 
soldier.  There  is  danger  of  collisions  being  brought  on  by  such 
causes. 

"  My  observations  lead  me  to  the  conclusion  that  the  citizens  of 
the  Southern  States  are  anxious  to  return  to  self-government 
within  the  Union  as  soon  as  possible  ;  that  while  reconstructing, 
they  want  and  require  protection  from  the  Government  ;  that 
they  are  in  earnest  in  wishing  to  do  what  they  think  is  required 
by  the  Government  not  humiliating  to  them  as  citizens  ;  and  that 
if  such  a  course  were  pointed  out  they  would  pursue  it  in  good 
faith.  It  is  to  be  regretted  that  there  cannot  be  a  greater  com 
mingling  at  this  time  between  the  citizens  of  the  two  sections, 
and  particularly  of  those  intrusted  with  the  law-making  power. 

"U.  S.  GRANT, 

4 '  Lieutenant-  General. ' ' 

Again  in  1867,  when  examined  before  a  committee  of 
Congress,  General  Grant  said  : 

"  I  know  that  immediately  after  the  close  of  the  rebellion  there 
was  a  very  fine  feeling  manifested  in  the  South,  and  I  thought 
we  ought  to  take  advantage  of  it  as  soon  as  possible." 

This  needs  no  comment.  General  Grant's  statements 
speak  for  themselves. 

However,   while  resolving  most   loyally  to  maintain 


104 

and  abide  by  both  propositions — to  wit,  that  slavery  and 
secession  were  forever  done  for — the  people  of  the  South 
looked  with  horror  and  dismay  upon  what  it  now  ap 
peared  their  conquerors  had  in  store  for  them.  When 
it  was  announced  that  the  Government  intended  to  place 
the  ballot  in  the  hands  of  the  negroes,  and  at  the  same 
time  to  put  restrictions  upon  their  own  right  of  voting, 
then  indeed  did  they  become  sick  at  heart.  It  would 
require  a  much  more  graphic  pen  than  mine  to  rightly 
picture  the  outlook  of  this  to  their  minds.  Indeed,  it 
is  not  possible  for  word-painting  to  give  an  adequate 
idea  of  what  this  foretokened  to  them.  In  the  States 
of  Virginia,  North  Carolina,  South  Carolina,  Georgia, 
Alabama,  Mississippi,  Louisiana,  Florida,  Arkansas,  and 
Texas,  the  negro  population  nearly  balanced  the  white 
— in  some  States  exceeded  it.  This  negro  population 
had  always  been  the  white  population's  slaves.  The 
white  population,  from  the  very  settlement  of  the  colo 
nies,  had  been  educated  and  trained  in  a  course  of  life 
which  tends  to  rear  a  race  peculiarly  sensitive  to  what 
it  views  as  personal  indignity.  It  looked  Avith  a  horror 
that  cannot  be  described  upon  the  prospect  that  a  race, 
distinctly  marked  off  from  itself  by  the  hand  of  God, 
which  had  always  theretofore  been  their  slaves,  should 
be  converted  in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye  into  their 
masters. 

But  to  get  any  appreciation  of  their  feelings,  it  is 
necessary  to  obtain  some  sort  of  idea  of  what  this  race 
was.  It  was  distinctly  marked  of!  from  them  by  color. 
It  had  been  brought  to  this  country  in  a  savage  state, 


105 

little,  if  any,  superior  in  point  of  civilization  to  the 
jackals  and  monkeys  of  its  native  forests  and  jungles  ; 
its  place  during  its  sojourn  here  had  been  more  that  of 
a  domestic  animal  than  of  a  member  of  the  human 
family.  It  was  utterly  uneducated — talked  a  jargon 
almost  unintelligible  to  those  unused  to  it. 

Judge  B.  R.  Carpenter,  a  Republican,  who  voted  for 
Mr.  Lincoln  at  his  second  election,  and  for  General 
Grant-both  times— who  was  a  judge  in  South  Carolina 
in  carpet-bagger  days,  and  a  member  of  her  Legislature 
— in  his  testimony  before  the  Congressional  Committee 
made  the  following  statement  relative  to  the  negroes  : 

"  The  colored  population  upon  the  sea-coast  and  upon  the  rivers, 
in  point  of  intelligence,  is  just  as  slightly  removed  from  the  animal 
creation  as  it  is  conceivable  for  a  man  to  be.  I  venture  to  say  that 
no  gentleman  here  "would  be  able  to  understand  one  of  them  upon 
the  witness  stand,  or  would  be  able  to  know  what  he  meant.  I 
have  had  to  exercise  more  patience  and  ingenuity  in  that  particu 
lar,  to  have  more  explanations  and  interpretations,  to  find  out 
what  a  witness  meant  to  say  'who  had  witnessed  a  murder  for  in 
stance,  than  to  understand  anything  else  in  my  life.  They  talk  a 
very  outlandish  idiom,  utterly  unknown  to  me.  They  are  very 
ignorant,  and  still  have  very  strong  passions,  and  these  bad  men 
lead  them  just  as  a  man  would  drive  or  lead  a  flock  of  sheep." 
("  The  Prostrate  State,"  p.  263.) 

Now  I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  all  the  negroes  in  the 
South  are  upon  as  low  a  level  as  the  sea-coast  negroes. 
It  is  undoubtedly  true  that  those  in  the  more  elevated 
country  are  superior  to  them  in  intelligence.  But  I  do 
mean  to  say  that  there  is  no  region  of  the  South  where 
they  are  sufficiently  advanced  upon  the  sea-coast  negro 

5* 


106 

for  a  suggestion  of  putting  them  over  the  whites  to  be 
tolerated  for  one  moment. 

Was  it  unnatural  that  the  white  people,  being  a 
race  such  as  the  people  of  the  South  were,  should  have 
stood  aghast  at  the  idea  of  being  forced  all  at  once  into 
subjection  to  the  negroes — a  race  such  as  the  negroes 
were  ?  Was  the  feeling  unnatural  ?  Can  Northern 
men  say  it  was  unnatural  ?  What  means  the  antipathy 
between  the  races  when  it  is  undertaken  to  enforce  social 
contact  and  intercourse,  which  the  developments  in  the 
Whittaker  investigation  disclose  ?  What  Republican, 
or  son  of  a  Republican,  at  West  Point  was  there  that 
would  permit  Whittaker  to  have  any  association  with 
him  ?  Was  not  Whittaker  as  absolutely  ostracized  at 
West  Point  as  if  he  had  been  a  leper  ? 

But  the  degradation  of  the  thing  was  not  the  only  ter 
ror  that  was  presented  to  their  minds.  Eemove  the 
bonds  suddenly  from  the  hands  of  people  like  the 
negroes,  and  give  full  rein  to  their  license  and  their 
lust,  and  what  sort  of  social  condition  would  necessarily 
follow  at  once  ?  Is  it  necessary  to  describe  it  in  detail  ? 
Does  not  each  mind  at  once  paint  for  itself  a  picture  of 
what  would  follow  ? 

As  soon  as  the  policy  of  Reconstruction  was  deter 
mined  on,  the  General  Government  decreed  that  no  per 
son  should  exercise  any  share  in  political  power  unless 
he  could  swear  that  he  never  entertained  any  sympathy 
for  the  Confederacy.  None  of  the  native  whites  could 
take  this  oath,  so  that  the  incumbency  of  office  was  at 
once  confined  to  the  negroes  and  the  strangers  who 


107 

might  come.  The  strangers  came  in  all  the  abundance 
that  was  necessary  to  fill  every  office.  They  drilled 
the  negroes  into  organizations,  the  entire  aim  of  which 
was  to  rule  the  white  people.  They  used  their  votes  to 
put  themselves  into  all  the  offices.  They  constituted 
the  Legislatures,  and  filled  all  the  judicial  offices  and 
Executive  offices.  They  were  utterly  corrupt,  and  hav 
ing  gone  to  the  South  to  plunder  the  people  of  all  that 
they  could  lay  their  hands  on,  they  robbed  them  di 
rectly  and  they  robbed  them  indirectly.  The  army  of 
the  United  States  was  freely  used  by  the  Government 
to  sustain  them  in  all  that  they  chose  to  do.  The  white 
people  were  held  down  by  bayonets  and  compelled  to 
submit.  The  governments  which  were  imposed  upon 
the  Southern  States  during  the  period  of  Reconstruction 
were  the  most  infamous,  and  atrocious,  and  elaborate 
schemes  of  plunder  and  fraud  and  insult  that  any  civil 
ized  people  ever  were  forced  to  submit  to.  They  upset 
society,  jeopardized  life  and  property,  robbed  the  pub 
lic  treasuries,  literally  excluded  all  the  virtue  and  in 
telligence  from  participation  in  the  government,  de 
bauched  the  ignorant  negroes  ;  and  in  all  this  they  were 
sustained  by  the  General  Government,  which  sent  the 
army  there  to  sustain  them,  and  it  held  up  their  hands 
in  their  villainy. 

In  his  review  of  Malcolm's  "Life  of  Olive,"  Lord 
Macaulay  has  drawn  the  following  picture  of  the  con 
dition  into  which  the  British  Government  in  India  fell 
during  Olive's  visit  to  England  : 


108 

"  Accordingly,  during  the  five  years  which  followed  the  depart 
ure  of  Olive  from  Bengal,  the  misgovernmeut  of  the  English  was 
carried  to  a  point  such  as  seems  hardly  compatible  with  the  very 
existence  of  society.  The  Roman  proconsul  who  in  a  year  or 
two  squeezed  out  of  a  province  the  means  of  rearing  marble  pal 
aces  and  baths  on  the  shores  of  Campania,  of  drinking  from  amber, 
of  feasting  on  singing  birds,  of  exhibiting  armies  of  gladiators  and 
flocks  of  camelopards — the  Spanish  viceroy  who,  leaving  behind 
him  the  curses  of  Mexico  or  Lima,  entered  Madrid  with  a  long 
train  of  gilded  coaches  and  of  sumpter-horses,  trapped  and  shod 
with  silver — were  now  outdone.  .  .  .  The  immense  popula 
tion  of  his  dominions" — i.e.,  a  native  prince — "  was  given  up  as  a 
prey  to  those  who  had  made  him  a  sovereign,  and  who  could  un 
make  him.  The  servants  of  the  company  obtained— not  for  their 
employes,  but  for  themselves — a  monopoly  of  almost  the  whole 
internal  trade.  They  forced  the  natives  to  buy  clear  and  sell 
cheap.  They  insulted,  with  perfect  impunity,  the  tribunals,  the 
police,  and  the  fiscal  authorities  of  the  country.  They  covered 
with  their  protection  a  set  of  native  dependants,  who  ranged 
through  the  provinces,  spreading  desolation  and  terror  wherever 
they  appeared.  Every  servant  of  a  British  factor  was  armed  with 
all  the  power  of  his  master,  and  his  master  was  armed  with  all 
the  power  of  the  company.  Enormous  fortunes  were  thus  rapidly 
accumulated  at  Calcutta,  while  thirty  millions  of  human  beings 
were  reduced  to  the  last  extremity  of  wretchedness." 

Black  as  this  is,  it  is  hardly  an  exaggerated  picture 
of  the  condition  of  the  white  people  of  the  South  in 
Keconstruction  days.  From  many  things  that  I  might 
quote,  if  space  only  permitted,  I  select  the  following 
special  telegram  from  Richmond  to  the  New  York  Her 
ald  of  December  31st,  1867.  It  will  show  what  the  con 
dition  of  things  in  the  South  was  at  that  time  : 


109 

"  From  all  portions  of  the  State,  with  but  one  exception— the 
Shenandoah  Valley — come  accounts  of  a  reign  of  terror  because 
of  the  murderous  and  incendiary  proclivities  of  the  blacks.  In 
Halifax  County,  during  the  Christmas  holidays,  a  military  officer, 
much  against  his  will,  was  compelled  to  invoke  the  aid  of  the  mili 
tary  authorities  here,  as  there  were  serious  indications  of  disturb 
ance  on  the  part  of  the  blacks.  Everything,  however,  passed  off 
quietly,  the  presence  of  the  military  having  a  decided  influence 
with  the  incendiary  Africans.  Disguise  it  as  anybody  may,  a  war 
of  races  seems  inevitable.  Every  Virginian  with  whom  I  con 
verse  is  impressed  with  a  terrible  foreboding  of  the  coming  con 
flict,  and  incendiarism  of  factories,  dwelling-houses,  and  barns  is 
a  comnun  event.  The  Bureau,  a  most  iniquitous  machine, 
smothers  everything  in  the  shape  of  a  negro  outrage,  and  even  the 
military  authorities  are  unwilling  that  such  lawlessness  should  be 
known  to  the  people  of  the  North.  The  press  here  is  flooded  with 
accounts  of  these  outrages  and  increase  of  crime  among  the 
blacks." 

In  the  progress  of  Reconstruction,  the  white  people 
of  the  South  came  to  a  realization  of  all  that  was  most 
dreadful  in  their  anticipations  when  they  learned  that 
the  ballot  was  to  be  given  to  the  negro.  I  have  admit 
ted  that  there  were  violence,  disorder,  and  bloodshed 
there  during  those  dark  days.  It  has  been  exaggerated, 
yet  it  was  sufficient  to  be  deplorable.  But  what  else 
could  be  expected  from  the  condition  of  society  which 
the  General  Government  forced  on  the  Southern  States  ? 
There  is  but  one  surprising  thing  about  it,  and  that  is 
that  the  white  people  were  as  moderate  as  they  were, 
and  that  the  whole  land  was  not  literally  deluged  with 
blood. 

I  have  charged  in  my  Reply  that  this  state  of  society 


110 

was  due  to  the   carpet-bagger  governments  of  Recon 
struction  days. 

The  whole  gist  of  Mr.  Tourgee's  answer  to  my  Reply 
is  that  this  cannot  be  true  because  there  were  not  North 
erners  enough  in  the  South  to  have  wrought  out  any 
such  result.  He  goes  to  the  census  reports  of  1860  and 
1870,  and  undertakes  to  show  from  them  that  there 
were  in  1860,  119,913  persons  in  the  South  who  were 
born  north  of  Mason  and  Dixon's  line,  while  in  1870 
there  were  only  130,611  "  persons  of  Northern  birth 
resident  in  the  late  Confederacy— an  increase  of  10,698, 
or  1000  to  1,000,000  of  the  population,  or  one  in  one  thou 
sand,  or  one  tenth  of  one  per  cent."  He  has  staked  his 
entire  case  upon  this  proposition.  I  understand  his 
answer  to  be  an  admission  that  if  such  a  state  of  society 
had  existed  as  I  have  pictured,  then  there  would  be 
justification  for  what  he  calls  the  outrage  there,  as  a 
means  of  self-protection.  He  takes  issue  with  me  upon 
the  matter  of  fact  as  to  whether  there  was  such  a  state 
of  society,  and  if  so,  as  to  whether  the  carpet-baggers 
caused  it.  If  a  verdict  should  be  pronounced  against 
him  upon  this  point,  then,  by  all  the  rules  of  pleading, 
judgment  must  go  against  him  upon  the  whole  case. 
I  have  not  thought  the  matter  of  how  many  Northern 
men  were  in  the  South  in  1870  one  of  any  moment  in 
the  discussion,  and  I  have  not  therefore  examined  the 
census  reports  to  determine  whether  Mr.  Tourgee  has 
correctly  represented  their  figures  or  not.  "What  will 
follow  in  this  article  will  cause  those  who  think  his  fig- 


Ill 

ures  of  any  moment  to  look  to  the  reports  themselves 
to  learn  how  the  matter  stands. 

Before  proceeding  to  a  trial  of  the  point  at  issue, 
there  are  a  few  preliminary  remarks  that  I  wish  to 
make.  Mr.  Tourgee  rather  complains  of  personal  at 
tack  upon  himself  in  my  Reply.  I  will  admit  that  my 
work  was  written  under  the  impulse  of  strong  feelings 
of  indignation.  I  could  see  that  the  writer  of  "A 
Fool's  Errand  "  had  seen  and  knew  of  the  state  of 
affairs  in  the  South.  His  representations  of  matters 
there  were  discolored,  and  in  the  main  absolutely  false. 
I  therefore  looked  upon  him  as  a  man  who  had  wilfully 
and  maliciously  libelled  my  people.  With  the  excep 
tion  of  this,  and  of  one  matter  that  I  shall  mention  di 
rectly,  I  do  not  perceive  that  there  is  anything  of  a  per 
sonal  attack,  in  my  Reply,  upon  Mr.  Tourgee.  I  gave 
expression  to  sentiments  of  scorn  and  indignation  for 
what  I  thought  contemptible  conduct  in  him,  but  not 
more  freely,  I  think,  than  one  who  considers  himself 
deliberately  slandered  lawfully  may.  I  had  also  pro 
duced  what  appeared  to  be  conclusive  evidence  that  Mr. 
Tourgee  was  paid  money  by  a  corrupt  combination  of 
rascals  to  assist  them  in  bribing  a  law  through  the  North 
Carolina  Legislature  to  plunder,  for  their  own  benefit, 
the  State  of  North  Carolina  of  nearly  seven  millions  of 
dollars.  It  seems  to  me  that  it  was  perfectly  relevant 
to  impeach  the  character  of  the  witness  against  the 
South  by  showing  that  he  was  utterly  destitute  of  moral 
character,  and  that  his  testimony  was  not,  therefore, 
entitled  to  any  weight.  And  I  must  be  permitted  to 


112 

say  now  that  in  my  judgment  Mr.  Tourgee  would  Lave 
been  much  more  profitably  employed,  when  writing  his 
answer  to  my  Reply,  in  trying  to  satisfy  those  who  have 
read  the  evidence  that  he  was  not  an  accomplice  of 
Svvepson  and  Littlefield,  than  in  endeavoring  to  foist 
upon  the  public  misrepresentations  of  the  state  of  sen 
timent  and  feeling  in  the  South.  There  is  one  other 
remark  to  be  made  touching  his  credibility  as  a  witness, 
which  shows  him  to  be  so  utterly  reckless  and  careless 
in  his  statements  of  fact  as  to  justify  the  closest  scru 
tiny  being  given  to  whatever  he  says.  In  his  answer  he 
says  that  there  are  in  Kansas  50,000  colored  refugees, 
who  sought  her  borders  last  year  as  a  place  of  protection 
from  the  "bulldozer's  paradise."  Now  Census  Bul 
letin  No.  60,  dated  January  15th,  1881,  just  issued, 
shows  that  there  are  at  this  time  in  Kansas  but  43,910 
colored  people,  including  Chinese,  Indians,  and  half- 
breeds,  and  we  know  that  the  greater  part  of  these  were 
there  twelve  months  ago.  The  census  of  1870  shows 
17,108  negroes  and  9814  Indians  there  at  that  time. 
What  sort  of  a  witness  is  he  who  recklessly  makes  such 
a  statement  as  this  ? 

I  come  now  to  the  point  at  issue  between  us.  Mr. 
Tourgee's  argument  may  be  thus  formulated.  All  men 
know  that  figures  cannot  lie.  Now  the  census  reports 
of  1870  show  that  there  were  at  that  time  in  the  South 
ern  States  but  10,000  persons  of  Northern  birth  who 
had  gone  there  since  the  war  —  about  one  Northerner 
to  every  1000  Southerners.  This  small  proportion  of 
carpet-baggers  could  not  possibly  have  overthrown  so- 


113 

ciety  so  completely  as  it  is  represented  ;  consequently 
the  claim  is  false,  because  figures  cannot  lie.  This  is 
very  like  the  process  by  which  Bishop  Butler  demon 
strated  that  no  such  person  as  Napoleon  Bonaparte  ever 
lived.  Nevertheless,  though  the  Bishop  made  his  de 
monstration,  yet  Napoleon  Bonaparte  did  live,  and 
notwithstanding  the  Bishop's  demonstration  the  world 
will  always  continue  to  believe  that  Napoleon  Bonaparte 
did  live.  So,  notwithstanding  Mr.  Tourgee's  demon 
stration  that  the  carpet-baggers  could  not  have  so  com 
pletely  overthrown  society  and  plundered  the  people,  yet 
the  carpet-baggers  did  overthrow  society  and  plunder 
the  people,  and  the  whole  world  will  come  to  believe 
that  they  did  so,  Mr.  Tourgee's  demonstration  to  the 
contrary  notwithstanding. 

As  to  the  number  of  carpet-baggers  that  were  in  the 
South.  The  white  people  of  the  South  were  allowed  to 
continue  their  old  governments  until  1867.  Up  to  that 
time  there  was  nothing  there  to  tempt  the  cupidity  of 
the  emigrating  carpet-bagger.  Almost  all  of  them 
came  after  that  time.  In  1867  the  military  command 
ers  of  eacli  Southern  State  overthrew  the  State  govern 
ments,  and  began  to  fill  the  offices  with  carpet-baggers. 
Then  it  was  that  the  halcyon  day  of  the  carpet-bagger 
began  to  dawn,  and  then  it  was  they  commenced  to  flock 
into  those  States  like  the  locusts  of  Egypt.  They  were 
just  arriving  when  the  census  enumerator  was  at  his  work. 
Further  yet,  almost  all  who  were  there  in  1870  were 
there  in  the  character  of  carpet-baggers  distinctively. 
Almost  all  Northern  men  who  were  in  the  South  prior 


114 

to  the  war,  and  who  did  not  side  with  the  South  in  the 
war,  returned  to  the  North  before  or  during  the  war,  or 
were  dead  in  1870.  The  vast  majority  of  Northerners 
who  came  south  after  the  war,  prior  to  1870,  were  dis 
tinctively  carpet-baggers.  Those  that  came  were  not 
honest  immigrants— men  with  wives  and  families  seek 
ing  homes,  who  have  always  been  welcomed  in  the 
South — but  political  adventurers  looking  for  jobs  and 
opportunities  of  plunder.  I  do  not  think  it  would  be 
an  overestimate  to  say  that  of  the  130,000  persons  of 
Northern  birth  that  the  census  of  1870  shows,  according 
to  Mr.  Tourgee,  to  have  been  in  the  Southern  States  at 
that  time,  90,000  were  arrivals  since  the  war,  and  not 
one  tenth  of  them  were  honest  immigrants  looking  for 
homes. 

One  large  source  of  accession  to  the  carpet-bagger 
element  came  from  persons  who  had  been  in  the  em 
ployment  of  the  Freedman's  Bureau.  Directly  after 
the  war  the  Government  established  an  elaborate  sys 
tem  all  through  the  Southern  States  for  looking  after 
the  negroes  in  the  way  of  food  and  clothing.  Very 
large  sums  of  money  were  annually  spent  upon  this, 
and  many  persons  were  in  its  employment.  The  officers 
of  this  came  by  degrees  to  be  looked  up  to  by  the  negroes 
as  their  special  fiiends,  and  when  the  Bureau  was 
allowed  to  go  into  a  decline,  these  men,  by  a  very  nat 
ural  transition,  slid  off  into  the  character  of  the  special 
representatives  of  the  negro  in  politics.  I  do  not  mean 
to  say  that  all  the  employes  of  the  Freed  man's  Bureau 
were  bad  men,  but  it  had  a  larger  proportion  of  bad 


115 

men  in  its  employment  than  any  business  I  ever  knew. 
The  good  ones  quit  in  disgust,  and  either  settled  down 
among  the  people  and  became  good  .citizens,  or  returned 
North.  The  vile  carpet-bagger  element  of  them  took 
up  politics  for  a  trade,  and  went  into  the  business  of 
negro  representation. 

But  Mr.  Tourgee  is  welcome  to  all  his  figures,  and  to 
all  the  deductions  which  he  may  desire  to  make  from 
them.  Aided  and  sustained  by  the  military,  there  were 
enough  carpet-baggers  in  the  South  to  band  the  negroes 
together  into  solid  organizations,  which  had  but  one 
watchword — to  wit,  opposition  to  and  control  of  the 
whites  ;  there  were  enough  carpet-baggers  there  to  fill 
every  office  that  had  a  salary  attached  to  it,  and  there 
were  enough  carpet-baggers  there  to  overthrow  all  social 
order  and  make  the  very  name  of  government  a  mockery. 
Let  Mr.  Tourgee  name  the  neighborhood,  in  any  South 
ern  State,  if  he  can,  where  there  was  any  deficiency  of 
them.  Let  any  other  person  name  the  neighborhood  in 
which  they  were  wanting.  They  were  like  the  poor, 
"  always  with  us."  The  supply  was  always  just  equal 
to  the  demand.  When  I  hear  any  one  saying  that 
there  were  but  a  few  carpet-baggers  in  the  South,  I  re 
call  Mercutio's  account  of  his  wound  : 

"  No,  'I is  not  so  deep  as  a  well,  nor  so  wide 
As  a  church  door  ;  but  'tis  enough,  'twill  serve." 

There  were  enough  there,  sustained  in  everything  as 
they  were  by  the  military,  and  backed  by  the  entire 
negro  population,  to  make  the  situation  of  the  white 
people  but  little  if  any  better  than  that  of  the  poor 


116 

Bengalese  while  Olive  was  in  England.  General  Ord 
commanded  the  military  district  composed  of  Mississippi 
|  and  Arkansas.  In  his  report  upon  the  condition  of 
those  States  in  1867  he  says  :  "  The  will  of  the  colored 
people  may  be  in  favor  of  supporting  loyal  office-hold 
ers,  but  their  intelligence  is  not  now  sufficient  to  enable 
them  to  combine  for  the  execution  of  their  will.  All  their 
combinations  are  now  conducted  by  white  men  under 
the  protection  of  the  military  ;  if  protection  is  with 
drawn,  the  white  men  now  controlling  would  withdraw 
with  it."  ("  Report  of  the  Secretary  of  War  for  18G7," 
p.  378.)  This  tells  the  whole  tale.  A  few,  sustained 
by  the  military,  were  far  more  efficient  than  numbers 
acting  from  their  own  unaided  force.  With  the  mili 
tary  to  sustain  them,  all  that  was  required  was  enough 
to  fill  the  offices,  and  then  the  carnival  of  fraud,  ras 
cality,  plunder,  insult,  contempt  of  every  obligation, 
whether  of  morals  or  religion,  set  in. 

I  will  now  show  the  real  state  of  affairs  in  the  South 
in  Reconstruction  days,  and  how  that  state  of  affairs 
came  about. 

In  1866  Congress  passed  the  first  of  the  series  of 
Reconstruction  laws.  This  act  divided  the  South  off 
into  military  districts,  requiring  the  President  to  ap 
point  an  officer  not  below  the  rank  of  brigadier-gen 
eral  to  command  each  district.  It  gave  to  this  military 
officer  complete  power  and  dominion  over  the  persons  and 
property  of  the  citizens  of  those  States,  and  full  control 
over  even  their  laws.  The  solitary  restriction  upon  his 
powers  was  that  he  should  not  inflict  the  death  penalty 


117 

without  the  approval  of  the  President.     All  other  penal 
ties  he  could  inflict  at  his  pleasure. 

From  the  end  of  the  war  until  this  time  the  State 
governments  were  in  the  hands  of  their  own  citizens. 
On  March  23d,  1867,  15  Stat.  at  Large,  p.  2,  Congress 
passed  an  act  which  provided  for  a  general  registration 
of  voters  in  the  fall  of  1867,  and  also  provided  that  no 
one  should  register  who  could  not  swear  that  he  had 
never  been  disfranchised  for  participation  in  rebellion 
or  civil  war  against  the  United  State  ;  that  he  never 
was  a  member  of  a  State  legislature,  nor  ever  held  any 
office,  executive  or  judicial,  in  any  State,  and  afterward 
engaged  in  rebellion  against  the  United  States,  or  gave 
aid  and  comfort  to  the  enemies  thereof  ;  or  ever  took 
an  oath  as  a  member  of  Congress,  or  as  an  officer  of  a 
State  or  of  the  United  States,  to  support  the  Constitu 
tion  of  the  United  States,  and  afterward  engaged  in 
rebellion  or  gave  aid  and  comfort  to  the  enemies  of  the 
United  States.  It' went  on  then  to  provide  for  conven 
tions  to  frame  constitutions,  to  be  elected  by  the  voters 
registered  at  that  registration. 

On  the  19th  of  July,  1867,  an  act  supplementary  to  this 
was  passed  (Ib.  p.  14),  which  declared  the  governments 
at  that  time  existing  in  the  Southern  States  to  be  illegal 
governments.  This  act  gave  the  military  commander 
of  each  military  district  of  the  South  power  to  sus 
pend  or  remove  from  office  any  and  every  State  officer 
holding  office  under  the  then  existing  State  govern 
ments,  whenever  in  the  opinion  of  such  commander  the 
proper  administration  of  the  Eeconstruction  laws  re- 


118 

quired  it,  and  to  fill  his  or  their  places  with  a  soldier  or 
such  civilian  as  he  pleased.  And  it  made  it  the  duty  of 
the  military  commanders  of  the  South,  in  express  terms, 
to  remove  from  office  all  persons  who  were  disloyal  to 
the  Government  of  the  United  States,  or  who  used  their 
official  influence  in  any  manner  to  hinder,  delay,  pre 
vent,  or  obstruct  the  due  and  proper  administration  of 
the  Reconstruction  laws. 

This  act  also  gave  the  board  of  registration,  for 
which  the  previous  one  had  provided,  complete  power 
over  the  matter  of  registering  an  applicant.  It  was  to 
have  power  to  refuse  to  register  him,  even  though  he 
should  take  the  necessary  oath.  It  also  provided  that 
the  true  intent  of  the  preceding  statute,  among  other 
things,  was  to  exclude  from  the  right  to  register  and 
vote,  incumbents  of  all  civil  offices  created  by  law  for 
the  administration  of  any  general  law  of  a  State,  or  for 
the  administration  of  justice,  who  had  afterwards  sym 
pathized  with  the  rebellion.  This  act,  and  its  enforce 
ment,  at  once  prostrated  the  existing  State  govern 
ments,  which  were  acceptable  to  the  people,  and  turned 
every  solitary  officer  of  them  out  of  his  place.  The 
district  which  comprised  Virginia  was  commanded  by 
General  Scho field.  In  his  report  to  the  General  of  the 
Army  he  says  that  this  act  "  prescribed  as  a  qualifica 
tion  for  office  the  oath  prescribed  for  officers  of  the 
United  States,  a  test  which  could  not  in  many  portions 
of  the  State  be  complied  with  by  any  considerable  num 
ber  of  persons  of  intelligence."  (See  Eeport  of  the 
Secretary  of  War  for  18G7,  p.  241.)  It  was  construed 


119 


as  General  Schofield  construed  it  all  over  the  South. 
(See  ib.  passim.)*  It  stopped  the  entire  machinery  of 
government,  and  that  machinery  remained  stopped 
until  the  military  commanders  filled  the  offices.  These 
they  filled,  by  appointment,  with  none  but  "loyal" 
men  ;  consequently,  as  there  were  no  "  loyal  "  natives, 
they  had  to  rely  upon  the  strangers  and  negroes.  In 
his  report  on  Virginia,  General  Schofield  says  that  in 
appointing  officers  preference  was  given  first  to  officers 
of  the  army  and  the  Freedman's  Bureau  on  duty  in  the 
State  ;  second,  to  persons  honorably  discharged  from  the 
army  after  meritorious  services  in  the  war  ;  and  third, 
loyal  citizens — all  strangers  to  the  people,  and  the 
"  loyal "  citizens  carpet-baggers  of  course,  as  there  were 
no  loyal  natives.  (See  Report  of  Secretary  of  War  for 
1S67,  p.  241.)  In  this  way  every  State  government  in 
the  South  was  converted  in  18G7  into  a  carpet-bagger 
and  negro  government.  Then  commenced  the  process 
of  reconstruction.  Constitutional  conventions  were  to 
be  elected  and  held  in  each  State,  and  they  were  to  be 
elected  and  held  under  the  joint  operation  of  this  sort 
of  a  civil  government,  supplemented  by  the  military 
government.  Elections  for  them  were  at  once  ordered. 
Mr.  Tourgee,  in  his  answer,  tries  to  make  the  im 
pression  that  the  white  people  of  the  Southern  States  so 
far  outnumbered  the  colored  in  all  except  three  States 

*  Whenever  I  have  referred  to  the  Report  of  the  Secretary  of 
War  for  1867,  it  is  to  vol.  i.  of  Executive  Documents,  printed 
by  order  of  the  House  of  Representatives,  during  the  second 
session  of  the  40th  Congress. 


120 


that  it  would  have  been  impossible  for  the  carpet 
baggers  to  get  such  absolute  control  over  those  States 
through  themselves  and  the  negroes,  and  he  produces 
the  following  table  to  show  the  comparative  white  and 
colored  population,  as  shown  by  the  census  of  1870  : 


Whites.        Col. 


Whites.        Col. 


Alabama 

5 

to 

4 

North  Carolina 

2 

to 

1 

Arkansas 

3 

to 

1 

Soutli  Carolina 

3 

to 

4 

Florida  , 

....     2 

to 

1 

..     3 

to 

1 

Georgia  

to 

1 

Texas  

to 

1 

Louisiana  

....     1 

to 

1 

Virginia  

.     2 

to 

1 

Mississippi.  . 

3 

to 

4 

West  Virginia.  . 

.  15 

to 

1 

It  would  be  sufficient  to  say,  in  answer  to  this,  that, 
sustained  as  the  carpet-baggers  were  in  all  that  they 
did  by  the  military,  and  oppressed,  as  the  white  people 
were,  by  them,  the  proportion  furnished  by  Mr.  Tourgee 
would  have  been  sufficient.  But  as  a  statement  of  the 
real  facts  relating  to  the  proportion  will  tend  to  show 
what  Mr.  Tourgee  Js  credibility  as  a  witness  is,  I  shall 
here  present  them.  The  Census  Eeports  for  1870  show 
the  following  table  of  population  for  the  above-men 
tioned  States  : 

White.  Colored.  White.  Colored. 

Alabama 521,384  475,510  N.Carolina.  678,470  391,650 

Arkansas 362,115  122,169  S.Carolina..  289,667  415,814 

Florida 90,057  91,689  Tennessee...  936,119  322,331 

Georgia 638,926  545,142  Texas 564,700  253,475 

Louisiana 362,065  364,210  Virginia....  712,089  512,841 

Mississippi 382,896  444,201  W.Virginia.  424,033  17,890 

Now,  let  any  one  who  feels   any   curiosity   about  it 


121 

make  the  calculation  for  himself,  and  he  will  find  the 
following  ratio  of  colored  and  white  in  those  States  : 

White.  Colored.  White.  Col'd. 

Alabama. ..  .less  than  4^  to  4  No rtli  Carolina. ..  l-,a0-  to  1 

Arkansas 3  to  1  South  Carolina.  ..  2*  to  4 

Florida 1^(T  to  1         Tennessee 3  to  1 

Georgia 1-^  to  1         Texas 2|  to  1 

Louisiana...  £  to  1         Virginia 1£  to  1 

Mississippi..  3  to  4  West  Virginia...  25  to  1 

Was  there  ever  a  more  glaring,  and  at  the  same  time 
a  sillier  effort  to  impose  upon  the  public  than  this  ? 
Mr.  Tourgee  surely  ought  to  have  known  that  the 
Census  Reports  were  accessible  to  others  as  well  as  him 
self,  and  that  those  who  knew  something  of  his  credi 
bility  as  a  witness  were  not  going  to  act  upon  his  state 
ments  of  what  they  contained  when  they  could  so  easily 
find  out  the  truth  for  themselves.  He  had  just  as  well 
have  attempted  to  make  a  misrepresentation  about  the 
multiplication  table.  He  was  just  as  sure  to  be  detected. 
What  credibility  is  to  be  attached  to  the  testimony  of  a 
witness  whose  statements  are  so  recklessly  made  as  this 
man's  are  ? 

I  do  not  knowjiow  the  registration  turned  out  in  the 
States  of  Arkansas,  Mississippi,  Louisiana,  and  Texas, 
but  I  have  at  hand  statements  of  how  it  resulted  in 
Virginia,  North  Carolina,  South  Carolina,  Alabama, 
Georgia,  and  Florida.  In  Virginia,  115,068  whites  and 
103,082  colored  were  registered  (Report  of  the  Secretary 
of  War  for  1867,  p.  22).  General  Schoneld  estimated  the 
number  of  persons  disfranchised  in  Virginia  at  about 

6 


122 

19,000  (ib.  p.  22).  In  North  Carolina  there  were  103,- 
060  whites  and  71,657  colored  (ib.  p.  23).  In  South 
Carolina  there  were  45,751  whites  and  79,585  colored 
(ib.  p.  24).  In  Georgia  there  were  95,214  whites  and 
93,457  colored  (ib.  p.  25).  In  Alabama  there  were 
74,450  whites  and  90,350  colored  (ib.  p.  25).  In  Flor 
ida  there  were  11,180  whites  and  15,357  colored  (ib. 
p.  25).  We  have  no  returns  for  Mississippi,  Louisiana, 
and  Arkansas,  but  of  course  we  know  that  the  regis 
tration  showed  large  majorities  for  the  blacks  in  each  of 
those  States,  except  Arkansas  and  Texas.  Thus,  so  far 
as  the  right  to  vote  at  the  elections  was  concerned, 
which  was  the  only  material  thing,  the  negroes  had  a 
majority  in  the  States  of  South  Carolina,  Alabama, 
Florida,  Louisiana,  and  Mississippi  ;  they  just  balanced 
the  whites  in  Georgia  ;  and  in  Virginia,  North  Carolina, 
Texas,  and  Arkansas  they  were  so  nearly  even  th#t 
they  had  no  difficulty,  with  the  aid  of  the  military,  in 
electing  their  candidates. 

In  each  State  a  constitutional  convention  was  elected, 
in  the  fall  of  1867,  by  the  voters  registered  at  this  reg 
istration,  and  in  each  one  of  them  a  large  majority  of 
carpet  -  baggers  and  negroes  were  elected.  Thus  was 
reconstruction  to  be  accomplished — by  the  formation 
of  constitutions — for  every  Southern  State  by  a  conven 
tion  of  such  representatives  as  these.  Mr.  Tourgee 
would  have  the  public  believe  that  the  white  people  were 
numerous  enough  to  have  controlled  the  election  of 
these  conventions,  and  that  they  either  assisted  in 
electing  the  delegates,  such  as  they  were,  or  were  too 


123 

apathetic  to  make  an  effort  to  elect  their  own  delegates. 
Neither  of  these  is  true. 

The  pretence  that  they  took  part  in  the  election  of 
such  as  were  chosen  is  simply  ridiculous,  and  is  not 
worth  considering  ;  and  that  they  exerted  themselves  to 
the  full  extent  to  elect  proper  delegates  can  easily  be 
shown.  If  they  could  have  controlled  the  matter  any 
where,  it  is  to  be  supposed  they  might  have  done  so  in 
Virginia,  where  the  registration  showed  that  they  had 
12,000  majority  ;  and  ^yefc  the  convention  that  was 
elected  in  Virginia  contained  an  overwhelming  majority 
of  negroes  and  carpet-baggers — was  one  of  the  most  dis 
graceful  bodies  of  men  that  was  ever  assembled  together 
anywhere.  The  truth  is,  it  was  not  upon  the  cards 
that  the  white  people  should  be  allowed  to  elect  their 
own  representatives.  It  was  decreed  at  Washington 
that  the  conventions  should  be  negro  conventions,  and 
the  elections  a  farce.  The  election  took  place  in  Vir 
ginia  011  the  22d  and  23d  of  October,  1867.  Let  any 
contemporary  newspaper  be  referred  to,  and  it  will  be 
seen  that  the  white  people  exerted  themselves  to  the 
utmost.  Let  any  one  consult  the  Herald's  Washington 
dispatch  of  the  night  of  October  22d,  1867,  in  the  Her 
ald  of  October  23d.  It  represents  that  the  advices  from 
Richmond  show  that  the  people  are  all  absorbed  in  the 
election — all  business  suspended  for  it.  And  let  any 
one  consult  page  389  of  the  Report  of  the  Secretary  of 
War  for  1867,  and  he  will  thus  learn  how  it  was  that 
the  negroes  elected  their  representatives  all  over  the 
South.  The  act  of  Congress  had  provided  that  the 


124 

elections  should  be  held  after  thirty  days'  notice.  Gen 
eral  Schofield  had  ordered  the  Virginia  election  to  be 
held  on  the  22d  and  23d  of  October,  and  that  the  polls 
should  be  closed  at  sunset  on  the  23d.  At  sunset  on 
the  23d  the  candidates  of  the  white  people  in  the  city  of 
Richmond  were  elected  by  several  hundred  majority. 
Consequently  the  polls  were  kept  open,  without  any 
authority  for  it,  until  midnight  of  the  24th,  and  then, 
by  hook  or  by  crook,  it  was  declared  that  the  candidates 
of  the  negroes  were  -elected.  A  full  account  of  this  can 
be  found  in  the  documents  accompanying  the  Eeport  of 
the  Secretary  of  War  for  18G7,  p.  389.  Proceedings  of 
the  same  sort  can  be  found  in  the  history  of  each  one  of 
the  Southern  States.  The  Eeconstruction  acts  had  pro 
vided  that  unless  a  majority  of  all  the  registered  voters 
voted  for  or  against  the  constitution  submitted  to  the 
people  for  ratification,  it,  and  consequently  all  officers 
elected  under  it,  should  be  considered  as  defeated  and 
rejected.  Let  us  see  what  the  experience  of  the  State 
of  Alabama  was  in  this  connection.  I  quote  from  the 
testimony  of  General  James  H.  Clanton,  taken  by  the 
committee  of  Congress  appointed  to  investigate  the  Ku- 
Klux  outrages.  He  said  : 

"  Congress  provided  that  if  a  majority  of  the  registered  voters 
voted  for  it,  it  was  accepted  ;  if  they  failed  to  vote  for  it,  it  was 
rejected.  Well,  the  last  Democratic  State  Convention  which  met 
left  the  question  as  to  policy  entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  Execu 
tive  Committee,  of  which  1  was  president.  This  question  had  to 
he  met,  and  it  was  a  grave  one,  involving  more  responsibility  than 
1  wished  to  take.  So  1  called  together  a  council  of  about  one 


125 


hundred  leading  me\i  in  the  State,  embracing  every  ex-member  of 
Congress  and  ex- judge  in  the  State.  We  met  and  deliberated,  and 
we  concluded  to  vote  against  the  constitution,  with  the  hope  of 
rejecting  it.  But  for  fear  it  might  be  adopted,  we  were  at  the 
same  time  to  take  care  of  ourselves  by  electing  officers  under  it. 
Having  agreed  upon  this,  we  were  about  to  adjourn,  when  we  re 
ceived  a  dispatch  from  Governor  Parsons,  who  was  the  accredited 
agent  of  the  Democratic  party  here  in  Washington,  saying,  '  I 
am  on  my  way  to  Montgomery  ;  will  be  there  to-night.  Don't 
adjourn  your  convention;  don't  act  till  I  get  there.'  He  came. 
Some  few  of  our  men  had  left.  He  made  a  speech,  in  which  he 
used  this  language  :  '  So  far  as  the  Reconstruction  measures  are 
concerned  and  this  constitution,  touch  not,  taste  not,  handle  not 
the  unclean  thing.'  He  frequently  used  that  language  afterwards 
in  his  Democratic  addresses  throughout  the  State.  Governor 
Parsons,  Alexander  White,  then  a  leading  Democrat,  who  prepared 
the  address  on  that  occasion,  but  now  a  leading  Radical,  and 
Samuel  Rice,  a  man  who  has  been  a  Secessionist  for  thirty  years, 
as  he  boasts,  and  with  whom  I  have  had  many  a  passage  at  arms 
—these  three  men  caused  the  council  to  reverse  its  action.  They 
are  now  three  leaders  en  the  other  side  in  Alabama.  At  this  time 
the  negroes  were  very  much  excited.  The  right  of  suffrage  had 
been  forced  on  them  by  Congress.  They  were  all  armed.  They 
had  half  a  dozen  league  rooms,  I  suppose,  in  our  city— several  at 
least— and  they  were  under  the  control  of  very  bad  men— adven 
turers.  A  great  many  had  got  hold  of  muskets  and  had  organized 
in  companies  and  battalions.  This  was  another  reason  urged  for 
not  going  to  the  polls,  that  it  might  lead  to  a  war  of  races.  The 
election  came  on.  The  white  people  did  not  go  to  the  polls,  or 
passed  resolutions  not  to  go.  The  consequence  was  there  was  but 
one  Democratic  Senator  elected  in  the  State,  and  he  ran  contrary 
to  our  policy.  There  is  but  one  now  in  the  State  Senate.  We 
knew  we  could  defeat  the  constitution  without  voting,  and  AVC 
thought  if  we  defeated  the  constitution  Congress  would  not  go 
back  on  itself  and  force  it  en  us.  Hence  the  intimidation  was  all 


126 


a  my  Hi,  The  Dcmocraitc  party  resolved  not  to  go  to  the  polls, 
and  we  did  not  go.  But  the  negroes  marched  to  the  polls  by 
battalions,  armed  with  muskets  and  stepping  to  the  beat  of  drums. 
They  stacked  their  arms  around  the  polls,  some  standing  guard. 
There  was  great  confusion,  and  in  the  evening,  in  Montgomery, 
they  got  on  the  rampage  and  commenced  firing  their  guns,  the 
balls  whistling  through  the  houses  and  lots.  They  continued  it  in 
the  night  until  Colonel  Crittenden,  the  Federal  commander,  being 
afraid  of  the  results,  disarmed  them  as  far  as  he  could  reach  them. 
But  many  remained  in  the  outskirts  of  the  town  firing  their  guns. 
The  balls  flew  around  my  house  pretty  thickly.  General  Meade 
appointed  the  managers  of  the  election.  They  were  all  Radi 
cals,  or  nearly  so.  He  received  their  returns  and  counted  the 
vote.  He  reported  that  the  constitution,  according  to  the  form 
of  law  prescribed  by  Congress,  had  fallen  short  a  good  many 
thousand  votes  of  the  majority  of  the  registered  vote.  We 
thought  then  that  we  would  continue  en  under  our  own  officers 
elected  by  the  people.  In  that  we  were  mistaken.  Every  one  of 
those  officers,  so  far  as  I  know,  was  'removed,  and  the  men  who 
had  been  voted  for  by  the  negroes  under  the  constitution  which 
General  Meade  said  was  rejected  were  installed  in  the  places  of 
those  elected  by  law — installed  by  the  bayonet.  They  are  in  office 
to-day,  with  few  exceptions,  having  held  over  six  years,  instead  of 
four  as  prescribed  by  the  constitution.  We  have  been  ever  since 
under  officers  that  we  never  voted  for,  except  those  elected  at  the 
last  election,  and  where  there  have  been  removals.  It  has  been 
very  galling,  but  we  have  borne  it." 

It  was  by  such  proceedings  and  methods  as  these  that 
the  Reconstruction  governments  in  the  Southern  States 
were  organized.  What  was  the  next  step  in  the  prog 
ress  of  the  drama?  Conventions,  consisting  of  such 
representatives  as  never  were  assembled  together  in  a 
civilized  country  before,  met  and  proceeded  to  frame 


127 

constitutions  which  disfranchised,  or  made  incapable 
of  holding  office,  the  entire  white  population  of  the 
Southern  States.  I  quote  a  provision  from  the  consti 
tution  that  was  framed  for  Virginia. 

The  fourth  clause  of  Section  1  of  Article  3  forever 
disfranchised  every  person  who  had  ever  held  any  office  of 
any  sort,  and  afterwards  engaged  in  the  war  on  the  Con 
federate  side,  or  had  ever  given  any  aid  or  comfort  to 
the  enemies  of  the  United  States.  As  we  have  seen,  this 
disfranchised  about  19,000  of  the  best  people  in  the  State. 
The  seventh  section  of  Article  3  provided  the  oath  that 
all  persons  must  take  before  they  entered  upon  the  dis 
charge  of  any  office,  State,  city,  or  county.  It  made 
them  swear  as  follows  : 

"  I, ,  do  solemnly  swear  that  I  have  never  voluntarily  borne 

arms  against  the  United  States,  since  I  have  been  a  citizen  thereof  ; 
that  1  have  voluntarily  given  no  aid,  countenance,  counsel,  or  en 
couragement,  to  persons  engaged  in  armed  hostility  thereto  ;  that 
I  have  never  sought  nor  accepted,  nor  attempted  to  exercise  the 
functions  of  any  office  whatever,  under  any  authority  or  pretended 
authority,  in  hostility  to  the  United  States  ;  that  I  have  not  yielded 
a  voluntary  support  to  any  pretended  government,  authority, 
power,  or  constitution,  within  the  United  States,  hostile  or  inimi 
cal  thereto." 

This  oath  made  it  impossible  for  any  native  white  Vir 
ginian  to  hold  any  office  whatever  within  the  State. 
There  were  not  fifty  white  Virginians  then  living  who 
could  take  it.  It  turned  the  entire  administration  of  all 
aifairs,  State,  city,  and  county,  over  to  the  negroes  and 
carpet-baggers.  God  in  his  mercy  put  it  into  the  hearts 


128 


of  Congress  to  permit  the  people  to  vote  upon  the  ques 
tion  of  adopting  the  Constitution  separated  from  the 
question  of  adopting  these  two  provisions,  and  we  made 
an  almost  superhuman  effort  all  over  the  State,  and 
beat  them,  and  in  this  way  Virginia  was  rescued  from 
carpet-bagger  rule. 

Thus  were  the  Eeconstruction  governments  of  the 
Southern  States  launched  and  set  afloat  by  the  process  of 
reconstruction  that  was  adopted,  and  from  the  time 
each  started  until  it  was  overthrown,  each  State  was  the 
victim  of  every  species  of  fraud,  robbery,  and  plunder, 
and  the  white  people  of  each  State  were  the  subjects  for 
every  species  of  insult  and  oppression.  It  would  serve 
no  good  purpose  to  give  the  history  of  the  carpet-bagger 
government  of  each  one  of  the  Southern  States.  Some 
of  the  facts  concerning  one  wilJ  serve  to  illustrate  all. 
They  were  all  alike.  I  select  the  State  of  South  Caro 
lina  because  the  materials  are  at  hand,  and  much  of  it 
comes  from  a  source  that  will  not  admit  of  question  in 
the  North. 

If  Mr.  Tourgee  thinks  that  South  Carolina  was  an 
exception,  and  that  it  is  not  fair  to  judge  all  by  her,  let 
him  name  any  other  one,  and  I  will  take  that. 

As  soon  as  the  constitution  adopted  by  the  black-and- 
tan  convention  of  South  Carolina  had  gone  into  opera 
tion,  a  legislature  and  the  officers  of  the  State  Gov 
ernment  were  elected.  This  was  done  in  18G8.  The 
following  were  the  executive  and  judicial  officers  :  Gov 
ernor,  R.  K.  Scott,  carpet-bagger,  and  recently  Super 
intendent  of  the  Freedman's  Bureau  ;  Lieutenant- 


129 


Governor,  a  negro  carpet-bagger  ;  Treasurer,  Parker, 
a  carpet-bagger  ;  Secretary  of  State,  Hayne,  mulatto, 
native  ;  Comptroller  -  General,  Nagle,  white,  from 
North  Carolina ;  Attorney-General,  D.  H.  Chamber 
lain,  carpet-bagger  ;  Land  Commissioner,  Leslie,  carpet 
bagger  ;  Adjutant-General,  Moses,  native  Jew  ;  Auditor, 
a  carpet-bagger  (name  not  at  hand)  ;  Superintendent 
of  Education,  a  carpet-bagger  (name  not  at  hand).  Of 
the  ten  officials  of  the  Executive  Department  of  the 
Government,  six  were  white  carpet-baggers,  all  or  nearly 
all  of  whom  were  officers  of  the  Freedman's  Bureau 
when  elected  to  office  ;  one  was  a  negro  carpet-bagger, 
one  a  native  mulatto,  and  one  a  foreigner  from  North 
Carolina.  The  Supreme  Court  of  Appeals  was  com 
posed  of  one  white  carpet-bagger,  one  negro  carpet 
bagger,  and  one  native  Jew.  The  Legislature  was 
composed  of  such  material  as  was  in  harmony  with  the 
executive  and  judicial  branches.  I  forbear  to  give  an 
account  of  it  in  detail,  because  it  may  be  judged  of 
from  a  succeeding  one,  of  which  I  shall  give  an  account. 
The  most  of  what  I  shall  say  of  the  South  Carolina 
government  is  taken  from  "The  Prostrate  State,"  a 
work  written  in  the  months  of  February  and  March, 
1873,  by  James  S.  Pike,  a  Republican,  and  lately  Min 
ister  of  the  United  States  at  the  Hague,  sent  there  by 
a  Republican  administration.  Mr.  Pike  was  at  one 
time  an  associate  editor  of  the  New  York  Tribune,  and 
was  sent  to  South  Carolina  by  the  Tribune  to  learn  the 
real  state  of  affairs  there.  He  had  no  interest  to  mis 
represent  or  color  matters.  He  was  a  Republican,  and 


130 

a  sojonrner  simply  in  South  Carolina  to  ascertain  the 
state  of  affairs.  The  House  of  Representatives  of  South 
Carolina  in  1873  consisted  of  124  members.  Of  these, 
the  white  people  had  elected  23.  The  other  one  hun 
dred  and  one  were  the  negroes'  representatives.  Of  this 
101,  94  were  negroes,  and  7  whites.  Of  them  Mr. 
Pike  says  : 

"  It  is  the  dregs  of  the  population  habilitated  in  the  robes  of 
their  intelligent  predecessors,  and  asserting  over  them  the  rule  of 
ignorance  and  corruption,  through  the  inexorable  machinery  of  a 
majority  of  numbers.  It  is  barbarism  overwhelming  civilization 
by  numbers.  It  is  the  slave  rioting  in  the  halls  of  his  master,  and 
putting  that  master  under  his  feet.  .  .  .  As  things-stand,  the 
body  is  almost  literally  a  black  parliament,  and  it  is  the  only  one 
on  the  face  of  the  earth  whick  is  the  representative  of  a  white  con 
stituency  and  the  professed  exponent  of  an  advanced  type  of 
modern  civilization.  But  the  reader  will  find  almost  any  portrait 
ure  inadequate  to  give  a  vivid  idea  of  the  body,  and  enable  him 
to  comprehend  the  complete  metamorphosis  of  the  South  Carolina 
Legislature  without  observing  its  details.  The  Speaker  is  black, 
the  clerk  is  black,  the  doorkeepers  are  black,  the  little  pages  are 
black,  the  chairman  of  the  Ways  and  Means  Committee  is  black, 
and  the  chaplain  is  coal  black.  At  some  of  the  desks  sit  men 
whose  types  it  would  be  hard  to  find  outside  of  Congo  ;  whose 
costume,  visages,  attitudes,  and  expressions  only  befit  the  fore 
castle  of  a  buccaneer.  It  must  be  remembered  also  that  these  men, 
with  not  more  than  half  a  dozen  exceptions,  have  been  themselves 
slaves,  and  that  their  ancestors  were  slaves  for  generations"  (p.  12 
etseq.). 

Leaving  wholly  out  of  view  what  a  government  thus 
constituted  did  in  the  way  of  heaping  daily  insult  and 
outrage  upon  the  white  people,  let  us  look  at  some  of 


131 

its  frauds  and  rascalities  for  a  moment.  In  1868,  when 
the  Reconstruction  government  commenced,  the  debt  of 
the  State  of  South  Carolina  amounted  to  $5,407,215.23 
principal,  and  $116,361.33  of  overdue  interest.  (See 
message  of  Governor  Orr  of  7th  July,  1868.)  It  is  impos 
sible  ever  to  know  accurately  what  these  people  made 
the  debt  mount  up  to,  but  Mr.  Pike,  after  collating 
and  examining  all  the  evidence  that  was  accessible, 
comes  to  the  conclusion  that  in  1872  it  had  increased 
to  $33,900,000,  nearly  sevenfold  (chap,  xviii.  p.  120). 
That  was  a  pretty  good  increase  in  four  years  for  a  State 
the  entire  property  in  which  was  worth  less  than  $200,- 
000,000  !-(The  assessment  for  1879  shows  $125, 717,214.) 
And  what  did  South  Carolina  get  in  consideration  ? 
Nothing,  absolutely  nothing.  Every  dollar  of  it  was 
stolen  by  the  members  of  the  Legislature  and  the  officers 
of  the  government  and  their  associates.  The  House  of 
Representatives  determined  to  furnish  their  chamber, 
and  appointed  a  committee  with  power  to  do  it.  When 
the  bill  came  in  it  amounted  to  $95,000.  When  the 
items  were  looked  into,  it  was  found  that  four  and  five 
prices  had  been  paid  for  everything.  Seven  hundred 
and  fifty  dollars  was  paid  for  one  mirror  in  the  Speaker's 
room  ;  each  official  had  a  separate  room  for  himself, 
gorgeously  fitted  up,  with  toilet-sets  and  all  the  para 
phernalia  of  a  dwelling-house  :  clocks  at  $480  apiece, 
and  chandeliers  at  $650.  Two  hundred  fine  porcelain 
spittoons  at  $8  apiece  were  provided  for  a  house  of  124 
members,  94  of  whom  were  Congo  negroes.  (Prostrate 
State,  chap.  xxiv.  .p.  201.) 


132 


It  is  curious  and  interesting  to  note  how  the  greed  of 
the  Legislature  and  officers  of  their  body  grew  and  in 
creased  with  indulgence.  The  following  is  a  compara 
tive  statement  of  furniture  purchased  for  them  by  the 
State  in  two  different  years  : 


1869-70. 
$5  clocks. 
40  cent  spittoons. 
$4  benches. 
Straw  beds. 
$1  chairs. 
$4  pine  tables. 
25  cent  hat-pegs. 
$8  desks. 
$10  office  desks. 
50  cent  coat-hooks. 
Cheap  matting. 
Clay  pipes. 
Cheap  whisky. 
$4  looking-glasses. 
$2  window-curtains. 
$5  cornices. 


1871-72. 
$600  clocks. 
$8  cuspadores. 
$200  crimson  plush  sofas. 
Sponge  mattresses  and  Oriental  pillows. 
$60  crimson  plush  Gothic  chairs. 
$80  library  tables. 
$30  hat-racks. 
$50  desks. 

$80  to  $175  office  desks. 
$100  wardrobes. 
Body  Brussels  carpeting. 
Finest  Havana  cigars. 
Champagne. 
$600  mirrors. 

$000  brocatel  curtains,  lambrequins,  etc. 
$80  walnut  and  gilt  cornices. 


(See  Report  Committee  on  Public  Frauds,  1877-78,  p. 
24.)  The  Touchers  for  these  bills  and  many  similar 
ones,  amounting  to  hundreds  of  thousands  of  dollars, 
are  in  the  public  archives  at  Columbia. 

"  One  F.  J.  Moses,  Jr.,  from  Brooklyn,  N.  Y.,  was  the  Speaker 
of  the  House.  There  was  a  negro  member  of  the  House  by  the 
name  of  Whipper,  who  was  the  proprietor  of  fast  horses.  Moses 
and  Whipper  had  made  up  a  match  race  for  $1000  a  side.  The 
race  was  fixed  to  come  oil'  on  the  said  4th  day  of  March ;  and  the 
explanation  of  the  recess  on  that  day  is,  that  the  House  adjourned 


133 

to  attend  this  horse- race.  The  race  was  run,  and  the  Speaker  lost 
the  bet  of  $1000.  Three  days  afterwards,  on  the  day  of  final  ad 
journment,  and  the  very  last  thing  done  in  the  House,  as  shown 
by  the  journal,  a  motion  was  made  by  Whipper,  '  That  a  gratuity 
of  $1000  be  voted  to  the  Speaker  of  this  House,  for  the  dignity  and 
ability  with  which  he  has  presided  over  its  deliberations.'  The 
motion  was  passed  by  a  large  majority."  (Prostrate  State,  p.  199.) 

And  so,  I  suppose,  Whipper  got  his  money.  It  came  to 
he  even  worse  than  this.  Scott,  the  carpet-hagger  Govern 
or,  actually  determined  to  arm  the  negroes,  and  he  spent 
$374,000  in  arming  them  with  Winchester  rifles,  under 
the  pretence  of  organizing  the  militia.  This  was  going 
further  than  endurance  could  go.  Such  mutterings 
began  to  be  heard,  along  with  the  groans  of  the  people, 
that  he  quaked  in  his  boots  and  was  frightened  into  de 
sisting,  but  not  until  many  rifles  had  been  issued. 

In  1871  a  joint  committee  of  the  Senate  and  House 
of  Representatives  of  the  United  States,  consisting  of 
twenty-one  members,  was  appointed  to  investigate  the 
Ku-Klux  outrages.  They  took  a  vast  amount  of  testi 
mony,  some  of  which  I  will  quote.  As  introductory  to 
it,  I  quote  the  following  paragraph  from  the  report  of 
the  minority  of  the  committee  to  Congress. 

"  Men  in  the  Northern  and  Western  Slates  have  but  a  faint  idea 
of  the  oppressions  wantonly  heaped  upon  the  people  of  the  South  ; 
of  the  insolence  of  the  adventurers  who  were  made  their  masters  ; 
of  the  strife  they  stirred  up  by  their  appeals  to  the  worst  passions 
of  the  ignorant  negroes,  inciting  them  to  crimes,  and  deceiving 
them  by  false  promises  of  conferring  upon  them  the  property  of 
their  former  masters,  in  order  that  they,  by  the  votes  of  the 
negroes,  might  ride  into  power  and  place,  which  they  never  would 


134 


have  thought  of  at  home,  and  thus  be  enabled  to  rob  and  plunder 
a  people  whose  most  intelligent  men  and  largest  property-holders 
•were  disfranchised  by  Congress,  the  more  surely  to  enable  the 
Freedman's  Bureau  agents,  and  other  adventurers,  to  obtain  and 
hold  undisputed  possession  of  all  the  functions  of  government, 
State  and  Federal.  A  careful  reading  of  the  testimony  taken  by 
the  committee — for  on  these  points  there  is  no  dispute  and  no  con 
flict — would  convince  every  impartial  man  that  the  endurance  and 
long-suffering  of  that  people  has  been  such  as  no  people  ever  be 
fore  exhibited. " 

This  report  was  written  by  General  Frank  P.  Blair, 
at  that  time  a  Senator  from  Missouri,  and  is  signed  by 
himself,  Senator  Thomas  F.  Bayard,  Senator  James  B. 
Beck,  Representative  S.  S.  Cox,  and  several  others  well 
known  to  the  country. 

Colonel  C.  II.  Suber,  of  dewberry,  South  Carolina, 
testified  to  the  committee  as  follows  : 

"  Q.  You  have  alluded  several  times  to  the  arming  of  the  militia. 
1  want  you  to  tell  us  what  was  the  general  arrangement  about  the 
arming  of  the  militia  ;  how  were  they  organized  and  armed  ;  were 
they  generally  white  or  black  ;  and  how  did  they  behave  when 
they  were  acting  in  their  organized  capacity?  State  fully  all 
about  that,  without  any  further  questioning,  so  far  as  your  in 
formation  and  knowledge  will  enable  you  to  do  so. 

"  A.  Well,  sir,  without  any  public  call  being  made,  the  first  in 
timation  we  had  in  our  community  that  there  was  to  be  an  organ 
ization  of  the  militia,  a  colored  officer  came  to  Newberry,  and  was 
met  there  by  the  colored  people  from  all  parts  of  the  county  ;  that 
was  the  first  intimation  we  had  of  it.  They  immediately  organ 
ized  companies  and  appointed  or  elected  officers  ;  1  think  they 
had  as  many  as  six  companies  in  our  county  ;  1  know  that  in  town 
there  were  three  mustered  in,  all  commanded  by  colored  officers. 

"  Q.  Were  all  the  men  colored  ? 


135 


"  A.  Yes,  sir.  Soon  after  they  were  organized,  they  drilled  for 
some  lime  without  arms. 

"Q.  When  was  that? 

"  A.  Last  summer  ;  about  the  month  of  June,  I  think. 

"  Q.  Was  that  after  the  canvass  had  begun  between  Governor 
Scott  and  his  opponent  V 

"A.  It  was  just  about  the  time,  or  a  little  before  the  convention 
met  ;  just  at  the  beginning  of  the  canvass.  They  were  drilled  at 
first  without  arms,  at  night  and  in  the  day  time.  Soon  after  that 
arms  were  furnished  to  them,  and  arms  of  the  most  improved  pat 
tern,  and  ammunition  in  abundance  ;  and  they  never  had  any 
political  gatherings  or  any  celebrations  except  these  companies  ap 
peared  with  their  arms.  They  were  drilling  and  mustering  through 
our  streets  then  day  and  night,  all  the  summer  and  fall. 

"  Q.  State  the  relative  proportion  of  the  blacks  and  whites  in 
Newberry  County. 

"  A.  I  think  the  proportion  is  about  five-eighths  black  to  three- 
eighths  white.  Their  majority  in  the  election  has  been  1300  or 
1400  over  the  whites. 

"  Q.  Were  any  white  companies  in  the  county  of  Newberry 
allowed  to  organize  and  to  be  furnished  with  arms  ? 

"  A,  No,  sir  ;  one  white  company  organized  in  town,  and  ten 
dered  themselves  to  the  Governor,  under  the  act  of  the  Legislature 
authorizing  the  organization  of  the  militia  ;  but  he  declined  to  re 
ceive  the  company  or  to  furnish  them  with  arms. 

"  Q.  About  that  same  time,  or  at  some  other  time  ? 

"  A.  Just  at  the  same  time.  After  the  colored  companies  were 
organized,  a  white  company  was  crganized,  and  their  services 
tendered  to  the  Governor,  but  he  declined  to  accept  them. 

"  Q.  So  that  the  only  armed  organizations  you  have  had  in  the 
county  of  Newberry  have  been  colored  ? 

"  A.  Yes,  sir. 

"  Q.  You  think  you  had  six  companies  of  them  ? 

"  A.  I  think  there  were  six  in  the  county  ;  there  were  three  tit 
the  Court  House. 


136 


"  Q.  "What  was  their  assumed  object  in  attending  political  gath 
erings  in  an  organized  military  form,  with  arms  in  their  hands  V 

"  A.  I  suppose  it  was  to  please  and  to  dazzle  their  own  people, 
and  at  the  same  time  to  resist  any  disturbance  that  might  occur 
if  any  should  come  in  their  way  ;  I  cannot  imagine  what  else  they 
went  armed  for.  They  had  their  cartridges  and  their  bayonets, 
and  I  suppose  it  was  for  that  ;  I  do  not  know  what  it  was  for. 

"  Q.  Did  they  attempt  in  any  way  to  intimidate  the  whites  ? 

"A.  They  marched  through  our  streets  frequently,  and  shoved 
everybody  off  the  sidewalks  who  came  in  contact  with  them.  In 
deed  nobody  cared  to  go  into  the  streets  when  they  were  parad 
ing  ;  it  was  unsafe  for  ladies  to  walk  the  streets  when  they  were 
out.  Their  celebrations  generally  occurred  in  a  grove  not  far 
from  the  town,  and  they  generally  closed  their  celebrations  by 
marching  into  the  Court  House  square  and  occupying  the  Court 
House  porch  or  steps,  from  which  harangues  were  delivered  to 
them.  The  compares  would  be  formed  in  front  of  the  Court 
House,  and  they  would  occupy  the  whole  square  ;  the  square  is 
rather  small. 

"  Q.  What  was  the  character  of  the  harangues  delivered  to  them  ? 

"A.  I  was  compelled  to  hear  them  because  my  office  was  within 
hearing,  and  I  could  not  do  otherwise  than  hear  them.  I  have 
heard  some  of  a  very  incendiary  character,  the  tenor  of  which 
was  to  persuade  those  colored  people  that  the  white  men  were  their 
enemies  ;  to  look  upon  them  as  their  former  masters  and  as 
tyrants,  and  not  to  trust  them  in  anything.  They  would  dwell 
with  peculiar  unction  upon  the  miseries  of  their  former  servitude  ; 
they  would  talk  to  them  about  the  lashes  that  had  been  put  upon 
their  backs  by  their  masters,  and  the  manacles  on  their  hands  that 
had  been  taken  off  by  their  friends,  the  Republicans.  They  would 
tell  them  that  they  must  not  trust  their  former  masters,  for  they 
were  only  seeking  to  get  into  position  where  they  could  re-enslave 
them.  All  sorts  of  appeals  were  made  to  their  passions,  and 
everything  was  said  to  inflame  them  against  the  white  people. 

"  Q.  Were  those  speeches  made  by  while  men  ? 


137 


"  A.  By  white  and  colored  men.  I  think  the  most  moderate 
speeches  were  made  by  colored  men. 

"  Q.  Did  you  ever  hear  a  man  by  the  name  of  Worthington 
make  an  address  to  them  ? 

"  A,  I  heard  Worthington  speak  from  the  Court  House  steps. 
He  was  of  that  class  of  orators  ;  I  do  not  think  he  was  so  incendi 
ary  as  some  of  the  others,  but  he  dealt  rrore  in  innuendo  than  in 
direct  appeals  to  their  passions. 

"  Q.   Were  appeals  made  to  them  at  any  time  to  apply  the  torch  ? 

"  A.  Yes,  sir.  I  have  heard  that  Joe  Crews,  a  member  of  the 
Legislature,  a  white  man  from  Laurens  County,  marched  through 
that  county  with  those  armed  companies  last  summer,  during  the 
campaign,  and  that  he  said  in  his  public  speeches  that  matches 
were  worth  only  five  cents  a  box,  and  that  that  was  the  remedy  for 
their  grievances." 

Colonel  Carpenter  testified  on  this  point  as  follows  : 

*'  Q.  What  do  you  know,  or  what  information  have  you,  of  the 
character  of  the  speeches  made  by  Crews,  and  men  of  thut  sort,  to 
the  negroes  during  the  canvass  ? 

"  A.  Well,  I  heaid  some  of  them.  1  did  not  hear  Crews  in 
public — I  mean  upon  the  stump  ;  but  I  heard  him  talk  to  a  crowd 
of  men  standing  about.  The  general  talk  of  all  such  men  as  Crews 
was  that  the  negroes  owned  all  the  land  and  property  in  the  coun 
try  ;  that  they  had  a  right  to  all  they  wanted  ;  that  if  the  white 
folks  did  not  let  them  have  it,  '  and  did  not  behave  themselves,' 
as  he  called  it,  they  would  burn  their  houses  and  kill  them.  I  do 
not  think  more  incendiary  speeches  could  be  made  than  Crews 
made  in  that  county. " 

Mr.  Joseph  Hernden,  of  Yorkville,  testified  as  fol 
lows  in  relation  to  the  same  matter  : 

"  Q.  After  that  time,  how  many  fires  occurred  ? 

"  A.   We  had  a  great  many  fires  in  the  county  after  that, 
think  the  next  fire  was  some  time  in  November  or  December. 


138 


There  was  a  gin -house  burned,  and,  1  think,  a  saw-mill.  That 
was  perhaps  the  next  fire  of  any  account. 

"  Q.  Was  that  supposed  to  be  the  work  of  incendiaries  ? 

"  A.  Yes,  sir. 

"  Q.  Then  you  had  a  fire  some  time  in  January,  had  you 
not? 

"  A.  Yes,  sir  ;  there  were  four  or  five  buildings  burned  one 
night  in  January. 

"  Q.  State  the  circumstances  attending  that  fire,  and  what  was 
believed  about  it  ? 

"  A.  Well,  the  people  there  believed  that  the  thing  was  con 
cocted  in  the  village,  from  what  they  could  gather  from  the 
negroes  ;  they  could  not  tell. 

"  Q.  State  all  the  facts  to  the  committee. 

"  A.  These  houses  in  the  country,  some  four  or  five  of  them, 
were  all  burned  about  the  same  time. 

"  Q.  Do  you  mean  the  same  hour  ? 

"  A.  About  the  same  hour,  yes,  sir.  Before  the  burning  com 
menced — I  did  not  hear  this  myself,  but  a  great  many  persons  did 
hear  it — there  was  a  volley  of  some  twenty  or  thirty  pistols  or 
guns  fired  off  in  the  street,  opposite  to  a  house  where  the  county 
treasurer  kept  his  office,  and  very  soon  after  this  volley  was  fired 
off,  those  buildings  were  seen  on  fire  ;  and  they  supposed  that  was 
a  signal  for  setting  them  on  fire.  Of  course,  I  do  not  know  ;  1 
only  give  what  was  the  impression. 

"  Q.  What  was  the  common  belief  of  the  people  ? 

"  A.  That  was  the  common  belief  of  the  people. 

"  Q.  Was  it  at  night,  after  the  people  had  retired  to  bed  ? 

"  A.  Yes,  sir  ;  one  or  two  o'clock  in  the  morning. 

"  Q.  What  were  the  buildings  burned? 

"  A.  There  were  one  or  two  barns  and  two  or  three  gin-houses 
in  that  fire,  as  well  as  I  recollect. 

"  Q.  In  different  parts  of  the  county  ? 

"  A.  Yes,  sir  ;  in  a  kind  of  a  circle,  from  the  north  around  to 
the  cast  of  the  village. 


139 

"  Q.  Was  there  a  large  gathering  of  colored  people  in  town  that 
night  ? 

"  A.  Yes,  sir  ;  there  were  a  great  many  negroes  in  town  that 
night  from  the  country. 

"  Q.  Do  you  know  the  cause  of  their  gathering  there  that  night  ? 

"A.  It  was  said  they  had  a  League  meeting  there  that  night ; 
that  was  what  the  people  said. 

"  Q.  Did  the  volley  believed  to  be  a  signal  for  those  fires  come 
from  that  League  meeting  ? 

"  A.  That  was  what  was  believed  ;  that  that  was  the  signal  for 
parties  to  set  the  fire.  I  do  not  know  this,  of  course  ;  this  is  just 
what  I  heard  talked. 

"  Q.  At  these  meetings,  held  and  largely  attended  by  colored 
people,  what  sort  of  speeches  were  generally  made  to  them  by 
their  leaders  ? 

"  A.  I  understood  that  there  were  a  great  many  of  them  very 
incendiary  speeches.  I  did  not  attend  any  of  their  meetings. 

"  Q.  What  was  the  character  of  those  incendiary  remarks  as 
you  have  heard  them  repeated  ? 

"  A.  I  heard  several  persons  remark  that  Mr.  John  L.  Neagle, 
who  is  now  the  Comptroller-General  of  the  State,  made  a  speech 
there  last  summer,  and  said  to  the  negroes  that  if  they  could  not 
get  this,  that,  and  the  other,  that  town  might  probably  be  laid  in 
ashes  ;  that  matches  were  cheap,  and  all  that  sort  of  thing.  I  did 
not  hear  that  ;  this  was  the  talk. 

"  Q.  Made  during  the  canvass  last  summer  ? 

"Yes,  sir." 

The  following  letter  speaks  more  than  volumes  from 
any  other  quarter  could.  It  is  from  D.  H.  Chamberlain, 
a  carpet-bagger  to  South  Carolina,  who  was  Attorney- 
General  of  that  State  in  the  days  of  its  most  infamous 
corruption,  and  afterwards  Governor.  It  was  written  to 
Colonel  W.  L.  Trenholm,  on  the  5th  of  May,  1871.  He 
says  : 


140 


"  I  propose  to  lay  aside  all  partisanship,  ami  simply  to  state 
facts  as  1  conceive  'them  to  exist.  Let  us  look  at  our  State,  when 
the  Reconstruction  acts  first  took  effect  in  1868. 

"  A  social  revolution  had  been  accomplished,  an  entire  re 
versal  of  the  political  relations  of  most  of  our  people  had  ensued. 
The  class  which  formerly  held  all  the  political  powers  of  our  State 
were  stripped  of  all. 

"  The  class  which  formerly  had  been  less  than  citizens,  with  no 
political  power  or  social  position,  were  made  the  sole  depositories  of 
the  political  powers  of  the  State.  I  refer  now  to  the  practical 
results,  not  to  theories.  The  numerical  relations  of  the  two  races 
here  were  such  that  one  race,  under  the  new  laws,  held  absolute 
political  control  of  the  State. 

"  The  attitude  and  action  of  both  races,  under  these  new  con 
ditions,  while  not  unnatural,  was,  I  must  think,  most  unwise 
and  unfortunate.  One  race  stood  aloft  and  haughtily  refused  to 
seek  the  confidence  of  the  race  which  was  just  entering  on  its  new 
powers  ;  while  the  other  race  quickly  grasped  all  the  political 
po\ver  which  the  new  order  of  things  had  placed  within  their  reach. 

"  From  the  nature  of  the  case,  the  one  race  were  devoid  of  polit 
ical  experience,  of  all,  or  nearly  all  education,  and  depended 
mainly  for  all  these  qualities  upon  those  who,  for  the  most  part, 
chanced  to  haw  drifted  here  from  other  States,  or  who,  in  very  rare 
instances,  being  former  residents  of  the  State,  now  allied  them 
selves  with  the  other  race.  No  man  of  common  prudence,  or 
who  was  even  slightly  familiar  with  the  working  of  social  forces, 
could  have  failed  to  see  that  the  elements  which  went  to  compose 
the  now  dominant  party  were  not.  of  the  kind  which  produce 
public  vir'ue  and  honor,  or  which  could  long  secure  even  public 
order  and  peace. 

"  I  make  all  just  allowances  for  exceptional  cases  of  individual 
character,  but  I  say  that  the  result  to  be  expected,  from  the  very 
nature  of  the  situation  in  1868,  was  that  a  scramble  for  office 
would  ensue  among  the  members  of  the  party  in  power,  which 
again,  from  the  very  nature  of  the  case,  must  result  in  filling  the 
offices  of  the  State,  local  and  general,  with  men  of  no  capacity, 
and  little  honesty  or  desire  to  really  serve  the  public. 

"  The  nation  had  approved  the  Reconstruction  measures,  not 
because  they  seemed  to  be  free  of  danger,  nor  because  they  were 
blind  to  the  very  grave  possibilities  of  future  evils,  but  in  the  hope 
that  the  one  race,  wearing  its  new  laurels  and  using  its  new  pow 
ers  with  modesty  and  forbearance,  would  gradually  remove  the 
prejudices  and  enlist  the  sympathies  and  co-operation  of  the  other 
race,  until  a  fair  degree  of  political  homogeneity  should  be  reached, 


14:1 

and  race  lines  should  cease  to  mark  the  limits  of  political  par 
ties. 

"  Three  years  have  passed,  and  the  result  is— what  ?  Incompe 
tence/,  dishonesty,  corruption  in  all  its  forms,  have  'advanced  their 
miscreated  fronts  ;  '  have  put  to  flight  the  small  remnant  that  opposed 
them,  and  now  rules  the  party  which  rules  the  State. 

"  You  may  imagine  the  chagrin  with  which  I  make  this  state 
ment.  Truth  alone  compels  it.  My  eyes  see  it— all  my  senses 
testify  to  the  startling  and  sad  fact.  1  can  never  be  indifferent  to 
anything  which  touches  the  fair  fame  of  that  great  national  party 
to  which  all  my  deepest  convictions  attach  rne,  and  I  repel  the 
libel  which  the  party  bearing  that  name  in  this  State  is  daily  pour 
ing  upon  us.  I  am  a  Republican  by  habit,  by  conviction,  by 
association  ;  but  my  Republicanism  is  not,  I  trust,  composed  of 
equal  parts  of  ignorance  and  rapacity.  Such  is  the  plain  statement 
of  the  PRESENT  CONDITION  of  the  dominant  party  of  our  State!'* 
(  Report  Ku-Klux  Committee,  p.  524  ) 

What  must  have  been  tlie  condition  of  South  Carolina 
when  such  an  admission  as  this  could  be  extorted  from 
this  man  ?  Comment  is  unnecessary  His  letter  speaks 
for  itself. 

These  rotten,  corrupt,  infamous  governments  piled 
up  the  following  load  of  debts  upon  the  Southern  States  : 
Alabama,  debt  increased  from  $5,939,654  to  $38,381,- 
967  ;  Arkansas,  debt  increased  from  $4,036,952  to  $19,- 
761,265  ;  Florida,  debt  increased  from  $221,000  to  $15,- 
763,447  (this  was  half  as  much  as  all  the  taxable  values 
in  the  State)  ;  Georgia,  debt  increased  from  $3,000,000 
to  $44,137,500  ;  Louisiana,  debt  increased  from  $10,- 
099,074  to  $41,194,473  ;  North  Carolina,  debt  increased 
from  $9,699,500  to  $34,887,467  ;  Texas,  debt  increased 
from  $3,000,000  to  $17,000,000.  (II).  p.  435.)  And 
all  the  proceeds  of  these  enormous  increases  of  debt, 
stolen,  the  poor  States  getting  positively  no  advantage 
whatever  from  them. 


Now  what  can  be  said  if  such  a  state  of  society  as  these 
governments  produced  should  have  caused  violence  and 
bloodshed  ?  Are  people  who  endured  it  for  years  and 
years  to  be  denounced  as  lawless,  turbulent,  bloodthirsty, 
and  cruel,  if,  in  their  rage  and  their  despair,  they  some 
times  broke  loose  from  the  bonds  of  moderation  and 
self-control  ?  All  reasonable  men  must  admit  that  for 
whatever  they  did  they  had  a  terrible  provocation. 

I  have  not  gone  at  large  into  the  details  of  affairs  in 
all  the  States,  but  what  I  have  shown  to  have  been  the 
case  in  South  Carolina  was  not  confined  to  that  State. 
It  was  the  state  of  society  which  the  Reconstruction 
governments  caused  all  over  the  South.  They  made  life 
almost  unendurable. 

Mr.  Tourgee  and  the  Republican  party  generally  will 
insist  that  the  negro  of  the  South  is  oppressed  and  mal 
treated  by  the  white  man,  and  that  the  General  Govern 
ment  must  protect  him.  They  are  willing  to  overthrow 
and  trample  under  foot  all  the  theories  and  traditions 
of  our  Government  which  declare  that  local  matters  must 
be  left  to  local  government,  to  protect  the  negro  from 
the  wrongs  that  they  imagine  the  white  people  of  the 
South  inflict  upon  him  ;  and  just  as  in  all  other  cases 
of  officious  intermeddling  with  what  does  not  concern 
the  meddler,  they  themselves  cause  the  very  evil  which 
they  would  seek  to  prevent,  and  which  does  not  and 
would  not  exist  if  they  would  only  let  matters  alone 
that  do  not  concern  them.  There  is  no  animosity  be 
tween  the  two  races  in  the  South  when  they  are  let 
alone,  and  the  negroes  are  not  stirred  up  into  a  state  of 


143 


political  agitation  by  bummers,  adventurers,  and  other 
forms  of  carpet-baggers  for  their  own  aggrandizement. 
The  two  races  have  been  raised  together  ;  they  under 
stand  each  other,  and  therefore  adapt  themselves  the 
one  to  the  other,  and  dwell  together  in  absolute  peace 
and  harmony  when  they  are  not  disturbed.  Notwith 
standing  the  terrible  provocation  to  which  the  white 
people  were  subjected  in  Eeconstruction  days,  there 
were  no  outrages  on  the  negroes  inspired  by  a  dispo 
sition  to  be  cruel  to  them.  Whatever  occurred  in  the 
nature  of  violence  was  measures  resorted  to  by  the  people 
as  means  of  self -protect!  on  and  defence.  The  only 
places  where  It  can  be  pretended  there  was  anything  like 
an  organization  of  the  white  people  to  oppose  the 
negroes  with  arms,  were  small  parts  of  North  Carolina, 
Alabama,  Mississippi,  and  possibly  Louisiana.  And  in 
North  Carolina,  whatever  there  was  of  organization  ap 
pears  to  have  been  in  the  counties  over  which  A.  W. 
Tourgee  presided  as  carpet-bagger  circuit  judge.  He 
made  the  situation  of  the  white  people  of  those  counties 
so  intolerable  that  they  could  not  live  under  it.  Let  any 
white  man  from  North  Carolina,  from  any  one  of  the 
counties  in  Tourgee's  circuit,  be  asked  about  him,  and 
anathemas  upon  his  head  will  be  the  reply.  The  surest 
evidence  that  the  Ku-Klux  conspiracy  in  North  Carolina 
was  not  what  Tourgee  represents  it  is  the  fact  that  he  is 
to-day  living  to  slander  her  people  after  having  got 
from  them  all  he  could  lay  his  hands  on.  Where  there 
were  no  carpet-baggers  there  has  been  no  pretence  that 


144 


there  were  Ku-Klux,   rifle  clubs,   Eed  Shirt  or  other 
conspiracies. 

Virginia  rescued  herself  from  carpet-bagger  govern 
ment  in  1869,  as  I  have  already  shown.  From  that  time 
to  this  her  government  officers  and  her  Legislature  have 
consisted  of  persons  chosen  by  the  white  people.  There 
is  no  pretence  that  during  all  that  interval  the  negroes 
in  Virginia  have  received  any  other  than  the  most  ab 
solute  fairness  and  justice  in  their  treatment.  Her 
record  in  this  respect  is  one  that  she  can  point  to  with 
pride.  In  1870  she  established  an  elaborate  system  of 
public  free  schools  for  white  and  black  alike,  which  she 
has  ever  since  sustained,  though  weighed*  down  to  the 
very  ground  by  an  enormous  public  debt,  upon  which 
she  has  regularly  paid  $1,200,000  of  interest  each  year. 
The  following  table  exhibits  her  school  statistics  in  that 
time  : 


YBAK. 

No  of  Pupils. 

Colored. 

Cost  for  the  Year. 

1871  

131  088 

88  554 

$587472  39 

1872  

166  377 

46  736 

993  318  59 

1873  ... 

160  859 

47596 

950  419  05 

1874  

173  875 

52  086 

1  004  990  02 

1875 

184  486 

54  941 

1  021  396  68 

1876  
1877  

199,856 
204  974 

62,178 
65  043 

1.069,679  56 
1  050  346  57 

1878  

202  244 

61  772 

961  894  97 

1870  . 

108  074 

35  768 

570  389  15 

1880.  

220  736 

68000 

946  109  33 

This  is  nearly  forty  cents  tax  on  the  hundred  dollars 


145 

of  property  for  schools  alone  ;  much  more  than  some 
States  pay  for  all  purposes. 

Whoever  will  take  the  trouble  to  go  over  this  table 
will  see  that  the  average  between  white  and  black  at 
school  is  a  little  more  than  three  to  one,  and  that  the 
proportion  is  about  the  same  each  year.  This  does  not 
come  from  superior  facilities  being  provided  for  the 
white  to  those  provided  for  the  negroes.  Tlie  system 
maintained  for  the  negroes  would  suffice  for  many  times 
the  number  of  children  sent  to  the  schools.  The  negroes 
do  not  all  thoroughly  appreciate  the  advantages  of  edu 
cation  yet,  however,  and  they  do  not  send  their  children 
to  the  schools  as  generally  as  the  .whites  do.  About  one- 
third  of  the  money  which  this  table  exhibits  has  been 
spent  in  educating  negro  children  in  Virginia.  In  order 
to  do  this,  the  white  people  of  Virginia  have  voluntarily 
borne  what  is,  I  believe,  much  the  heaviest  rate  of  tax 
ation  paid  by  any  State  in  the  Union.  (The  negroes 
have  paid  little  or  nothing.)  The  entire  sum  of  values 
in  the  State  is  less  than  $300,000,000.  (The  assess 
ments  for  1880  are  not  all  in  yet,  but  enough  are  in  to 
show  that  the  values  will  not  be  much  above  $250,- 
000,000.)  During  all  this  time  the  white  people  of 
Virginia  have  voluntarily  taxed  themselves  to  keep  up 
their  State  government,  at  an  annual  cost  of  nearly  one 
million  dollars,  to  pay  annually  $1,200,000  of  interest 
upon  their  public  debt,  and  to  keep  up  the  public  free- 
school  system.  All  this  has  been  done  notwithstanding 
the  losses  by  the  war,  the  devastation  of  the  State,  and 

7 


146 

the  utter  disorganization  of  labor  which  the  war  left 
behind  it. 

They  have  in  the  same  way  cared  for  the  negro  insane. 
They  have  established  a  central  lunatic  hospital  at  Rich 
mond,  in  which  all  the  insane  negroes  in  the  State  are 
placed,  and  there  they  receive  the  benefit  of  all  the 
methods  which  science  shows  best  adapted  to  the  treat 
ment  of  the  insane. 

The  Census  Eeports  for  1880  make  some  astonishing 
revelations  pertinent  to  the  subject  under  discussion. 
They  show  an  increase  of  productions,  manufactures, 
and  population  in  the  South  which  is  simply  amazing. 
The  cotton  crop,  raised  in  the  "  Bulldozer's  paradise," 
has  come  up  from  2,193,987  bales  raised  in  1866,  or 
3,656,006  raised  in  1861,  to  upwards  of  6,000,000  raised 
in  1880.  All  the  other  staples — sugar,  tobacco,  corn, 
wheat,  live  stock — show  a  parallel  increase.  In  the  lim 
its  of  a  newspaper  article  I  cannot  of  course  display  the 
comparative  increase  in  all  these  matters,  which  would 
be  exceedingly  interesting  ;  but  the  exhibit  which  the 
cotton-growing  States  make  in  manufacturing  cotton  is 
too  interesting  and  instructive  to  be  omitted.  The  fol 
lowing  table  shows  the  state  of  manufacture  of  cotton  in 
1870  and  in  1880  in  those  States.  Can  the  voice  of  the 
"  Bulldozer"  be  really  so  loud  in  the  land  when  such  re 
sults  are  shown  as  this  table  exhibits  ?  This  is  the  pros 
perity  of  peace.  None  but  an  orderly  population  can 
wax  fat  after  this  manner.  The  horn  of  plenty  must 
hang  in  the  land  where  such  figures  as  these  are  shown. 


147 


Connecticut.  . 
Massachusetts 
N.  Hampshire 
Rhode  Island. 


Ml 

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148 


These  tables  suggest  some  interesting  and  valuable 
lessons.  They  show,  in  the  first  place,  that  the  manu 
facture  of  cotton,  which  was  a  mere  infant  in  the  South 
ern  States  in  1870,  has  grown  in  those  States  in  ten  years 
into  a  robust  and  strong  man.  They  show,  in  the  second 
place,  that  while  the  production  of  raw  cotton  has 
doubled  in  ten  years,  the  average  increase  of  manufac 
ture  of  cotton  in  the  four  petted  New  England  States 
has  been  only  55f  per  cent,  while  the  average  increase 
of  manufacture  in  the  cotton  States  has  been  176  per 
cent.  They  show  that  while  Massachusetts,  the  petted 
child  of  protection,  drawing  on  the  entire  nation  for 
means  with  which  to  foster  her  manufactures,  has  only 
increased  them  77  per  cent,  Georgia,  manufacturing  the 
magnificent  quantity  of  67,874  bales,  or  27,149,600 
pounds,  has  increased  hers  148  per  cent.  They  show  that 
she  is  pressing  Connecticut  hard,  and  is  manufacturing 
nearly  one-half  as  much  as  Rhode  Island.  They  show 
that  the  people  of  the  Southern  States  are  beginning  to 
learn  that  their  true  interests  are  not  confined  to  raising 
cotton  ;  that  they  have  learned  the  value  of  their  mag 
nificent  water-power,  and  that  they  are  beginning  to 
wake  up  to  the  fact  that  the  place  where  cotton  is  grown 
is  the  place  where  it  can  be  manufactured  with  the 
largest  profit.  Ten  years  ago  New  England  looked 
down  with  scorn  upon  the  feeble  efforts  that  the  cotton 
States  were  making  to  manufacture  their  raw  material. 
She  now  sees  the  infant  of  ten  years  back  grown  to  the 
proportions  of  a  man,  and  threatening  to  dissolve  the 
bonds  by  which  her  monopoly  has  been  sustained.  She 


149 

must  arouse  and  shake  herself,  or  the  day  for  her  scep 
tre  to  pass  from  her  will  arrive.  While  New  England's 
Republican  rulers  are  busying  themselves  with  vain  and 
impertinent  investigations  of  the  local  affairs  of  the 
Southern  States,  those  States,  bending  all  their  energies 
toward  the  problem  of  how  best  to  utilize  their  fabulous 
resources — discarding  from  their  consideration  the  vexed 
questions  of  politics,  and  devoting  themselves  to  busi 
ness — are  stealing  from  her  the  talisman  with  which  she 
of  old  converted  their  rude  heaps  into  refined  gold. 
New  England  may  go  on  concerning  herself  with  the 
Southern  negro,  as  Brabantio  was  once  beguiled  by  a  cer 
tain  colored  gentleman,  until  the  negro  will  steal  her 
treasure  from  her  as  Othello  stole  Brabantio'sfrom  him. 
But  the  exhibit  which  the  Census  Reports  of  1880 
make  of  the  increase  of  population  in  the  last  ten  years 
in  the  Southern  States,  and  especially  among  the  negroes, 
is  positively  astounding.  I  do  not  believe  an  increase 
parallel  to  theirs  within  the  past  ten  years,  from  self- 
multiplication  alone,  can  be  shown  in  the  history  of  the 
world  ;  for  let  it  be  remembered  that  while  the  whites 
have  received  accessions  from  immigration,  the  accession 
of  negroes  has  come  from  procreation  alone.  The  follow 
ing  table  exhibits  the  population  of  the  States  named 
by  races  for  the  years  1870  and  1880,  with  the  increase 
of  each  race  per  cent  in  each  State,  with  the  average 
increase  in  all : 


150 


] 

^egi-o. 

White. 

1880. 

1870. 

Inc. 
per  c. 

1880. 

1870. 

Inc. 
per  c. 

Alabama  
Arkansas 

600,358 
210  953 

475,510 
122  169 

26i/2 
72 

661,986 
591  611 

521,384 
362.115 

27 
63 

Florida.   .. 

125,317 

91,689 

36 

141.249 

96,057 

46 

Georgia 

724  765 

545  142 

33 

814218 

638.926 

27 

Louisiana    

485,200 

364,210 

&3 

455,063 

362.065 

25 

Mississippi 

652  221 

444,201 

47 

479  371 

382,896 

25 

North  Carolina  

South  Carolina  
Tennessee  

531,315 

604,235 
403,343 

391,650 

415,814 
322,331 

35 

45 
25 

returns  in 
complete. 
391,071 
1,139,120 

678.470 

289.667 
936,119 

35 
21 

Texas. 

returns  in 

253  475 

returns  in 

564,700 

Virginia  

complete. 

631  827 

512,841 

23 

complete. 

880,376 

712,089 

23 

Total  average  increase  of  negro  population,  3S  per  cent  ;  total  average  in 
crease  of  white  population,  33 jj  per  cent. 

Here  is  an  average  increase  of  the  negro  population, 
by  self-multiplication  alone,  of  38  per  cent  in  ten  years. 
The  negro  increase  by  self -multiplication  alone  has  been 
five  and  a  half  per  cent  greater  than  that  of  the  whites, 
through  self-multiplication  and  immigration  combined, 
and  the  immigration  to  a  number  of  the  Southern  States 
within  the  past  ten  years  has  been  very  considerable,  and 
yet  the  increase  of  the  whites  has  been  such  as  to  be 
most  gratifying.  It  is  idle  to  talk  of  a  race,  which  has 
made  such  a  wonderful  multiplication  of  itself  during 
the  past  ten  years,  having  lived  always  in  terror  of  its 
life,  or  of  its  having  been  the  subject  for  unending 
murder  and  assassination.  When  people  have  to  protect 
their  lives  by  hiding  in  swamps,  they  do  not  increase  in 
this  way  ;  nor  can  they,  if  all  their  time  and  attention  are 


151 

occupied  in  looking  out  for  assassins,  raise  the  food 
which  is  necessary  to  their  increase.  Nothing  but  a 
land  of  peace  and  plenty  can  show  such  an  accession  to 
its  population  as  the  South  shows  for  the  past  ten  years. 

With  the  Republican  party's  record  in  relation  to  the 
negro,  it  ill  becomes  it  to  be  demanding  of  the  Southern 
whites  that  they  should  quietly  stand  by  and  permit  the 
negro,  such  as  he  is  in  the  Southern  States,  to  adminis 
ter  the  governments  of  those  States.  If  Rutherford  B. 
Hayes  is  to-day  President  of  the  United  States,  he  was 
made  so  by  the  votes  of  the  negroes  in  South  Carolina, 
Louisiana,  and  Florida.  What  appointments  has  E.  B. 
Hayes  conferred  upon  negroes  ?  Where  is  the  foreign 
mission,  the  judicial  office,  the  cabinet  appointment,  the 
post-office,  the  collectorship  of  the  revenue,  the  district- 
attorneyship  that  he  has  given  to  a  negro  ?  Mr.  Gar- 
field  is  to-day  President-elect  by  the  negro  vote.  New 
York,  Indiana,  and  Connecticut  were  all  carried  for  him 
by  negro  votes.  His  majority  in  New  York  was  21,033. 
The  census  returns  for  1880  for  New  York  are  not  yet 
complete,  but  for  New  York  City  and  38  out  of  the  60 
counties  in  the  State  they  show  54,554  negroes.  The 
other  twenty-two  counties  will  certainly  increase  this  to 
75,000.  Now,  allowing  one  voter  to  each  five  of  the 
population,  and  we  have  15,000  negro  voters.  Strike 
15,000  votes  from  Mr.  Garfield  in  New  York  and  add 
them  to  General  Hancock,  and  where  would  Mr.  Gar- 
field  be  ? 

The  census  of  1880  is  complete  as  to  Indiana,  and  it 
shows  39,268  negroes  in  that  State.  This  gives  nearly 


8000  voters.  Mr.  Garfield  carried  Indiana  by  G642  votes. 
Strike  the  negro  vote  from  his,  and  where  would  he  be  ? 

He  carried  Connecticut  by  2056  votes.  The  returns 
are  not  complete  yet  for  Connecticut,  but  returns  from 
eight  counties  show  11,799  negroes,  the  voting  popula 
tion  of  which  is  just  about  equal  to  his  majority. 

Now,  though  the  Kepublican  party  will  be  kept  in 
power  for  the  next  four  years  by  the  negro  vote,  what 
appointments  will  Mr.  Gar  field  confer  upon  them? 
Will  he  make  the  postmaster  of  New  York  City  a  negro  ? 
Will  the  collector  of  that  port  be  a  negro  ?  "Will  the 
Supervisor  of  Internal  Revenue  be  a  negro  ?  And  what 
would  happen  if  he  should  make  these  officers  negroes  ? 
What  would  the  saintly  city  of  Boston  even  do,  if  he 
should  appoint  negroes  to  those  offices  there  ?  I  rather 
opine  that  even  her  sanctified  exterior  would  suffer  a 
slight  ruffle  if  this  should  be  done. 

In  the  spring  of  1880,  Judge  Alexander  Rives,  Repub 
lican  United  States  District  Judge  for  the  Western  Dis 
trict  of  Virginia,  had  a  number  of  Virginia  county 
judges  indicted  in  his  court  for  failing  to  put  negroes  on 
their  juries.  These  gentlemen  were  all  men  of  as  high 
character  as  any  in  tlie  State,  and  administered  the  laws 
as  fairly  and  impartially  towards  all  orders  and  races  as 
it  was  possible  to  do.  Indeed  they  were  acquitted  on 
their  trial  by  negro  juries.  There  had  been  no  sort  of 
complaint  that  negroes  could  not  get  justice  done  them 
in  their  courts,  but  just  to  keep  things  a-going,  the 
judge  had  them  indicted.  Now  in  Judge  Rives's  court 
the  judge  is  a  white  man,  the  marshal  is  a  white  man, 


153 

all  the  deputy-marshals  are  white  men,  the  clerk  is  a 
white  man,  all  the  deputy-clerks  are  white  men,  the 
crier  of  the  court  is  a  white  man — all  the  employes  of 
the  court  are  white  men  till  you  get  down  to  the  man 
that  washes  the  spittoons,  and  he  is  a  negro.  And  so 
the  Republican  administrations  have  thought  of  the 
negroes  and  have  acted  toward  them.  They  are  good 
enough  to  be  put  over  the  white  people  of  the  South, 
but  there  must  be  no  suggestion  of  putting  them  over 
white  people  in  the  North. 

The  trouble  with  Mr.  Tourgee  and  all  of  his  kind  is 
that  they  are  attempting  to  do  that  which,  in  the  un 
changeable  nature  of  things,  it  is  impossible  to  do. 
They  are  endeavoring,  by  constitutional  amendments, 
and  acts  of  Congress,  and  general  orders,  and  military 
supervisions,  to  form  and  develop  institutions  irrecon 
cilable  and  inconsistent  with  existing  institutions  in 
the  South.  Forms  of  social  development,  the  manner 
in  which  men  think  and  act,  the  point  of  view  from 
which  they  apprehend  facts  physical,  or  facts  meta 
physical,  moral,  or  political — these  envelopments  are  the 
institutions  of  society. 

They  begin  in  the  infancy  of  peoples.  They  grow 
with  the  foundation  of  nations.  They  spread  them 
selves  with  civilizations,  inhering  to  society  and  modi 
fying  themselves,  as  time  goes  on  and  circumstances 
change,  to  meet  the  changed  times  and  circumstances. 
They  are  the  institutions  of  society.  They  exist  before 
constitutions  are  dreamed  of,  and  they  continue  after 
constitutions  are  altered,  overthrown,  or  again  invent- 


154 

ed  or  reconstructed.  No  constitution  can  last  unless 
it  be  sympathetic  and  consistent  with  these  institutions. 
The  school  of  which  Mr.  Tourgee  has  been  made  the 
apostle  have  for  fifteen  years  been  attempting  to  force 
on  the  Southern  States  a  political  organization  or  con 
stitution  which  is  opposed  to  their  traditions,  their 
convictions,,  and  their  sympathies. 

They  are  using  all  the  moral  power  of  a  great  civil 
ized  people,  of  its  art  and  its  thought,  its  pulpit  and 
its  press,  to  establish  there  a  condition  of  things  con 
trary  to  nature  and  subversive  of  the  fundamental  prin 
ciples  of  social  order. 

Not  a  State  from  Massachusetts  to  Iowa,  not  a  city 
from  Boston  to  San  Francisco,  could  live  a  generation 
with  the  principles  of  the  Stalwart  Reconstruction  ap 
plied  to  them,  and  enforced  by  overpowering  moral  and 
physical  force. 

It  is  of  the  essential  nature  of  things  that  society 
must  rest  on  force.  That  force  may  be  wielded  by  the 
consent  of  the  governed,  as  the  American  constitutions 
insist,  or  it  may  be  controlled  by  pure  physical  force, 
without  regard  to  right  or  reason. 

Force  is  what  is  generally  designated  as  sovereignty, 
and  it  is  the  sanction  of  law  and  the  power  which  en 
forces  order  and  respect  for  law. 

This  force,  sovereignty,  power,  cannot  reside  in 
numerical  majorities.  It  comes  from  the  forces  them 
selves,  which  control  and  direct  social  development. 
They  are  manhood — in  the  Latin  sense  virtus — man 
liness,  intelligence,  property. 


155 

They  are  the  triune  source  of  the  social  forces — vir 
tue,  intelligence,  property.  American  experience  proves 
this.  Our  States  were  founded  on  the  idea  that  politi 
cal  power  was  a  trust,  and  therefore  it  was  granted  to 
only  a  portion  of  the  community.  In  some  States  it 
was  based  on  property  alone,  and  women  were  allowed  to 
vote  ;  in  others  on  property  and  race  combined,  and  none 
but  whites  were  intrusted  with  the  franchise  ;  in  others 
on  sex  and  property,  and  all  males,  white  and  black, 
exercised  the  power. 

No  statesman  or  philosopher  believed  that  government 
could  be  carried  on  resting  on  numbers  alone.  In  the 
experience  of  the  century  we  have  had  demonstrated  the 
utter  failure  of  the  system  of  pure  numerical  majorities. 
The  great  cities  are,  with  few  exceptions,  governed  by 
the  exterior  power  of  the  State,  their  incapacity  for  the 
protection  of  life  and  property  and  the  preservation  of 
order  by  rule  of  numbers  having  been  admitted.  The 
police  power  of  New  York  is  wielded  by  the  State  Gov 
ernment,  as  is  that  of  Chicago,  Boston,  New  Orleans, 
and  Baltimore. 

Where  numbers  alone  are  intrusted  with  power,  it 
has  been  abundantly  proved  that  intelligence  and  prop 
erty  assert  themselves  in  illicit  and  unlawful  ways. 
Bribery  is  the  revenge  of  property  on  universal  suffrage. 

The  State  Legislatures  this  winter  have  everywhere 
acknowledged  the  power  of  great  railroad  corporations, 
which  have  swayed  their  decisions  and  controlled  their 
actions. 

While  I  write,  the  power  of  the  national  banks  is  be- 


ing  exerted  on  the  business  and  labor  of  the  country  to 
deter  the  National  Legislature  or  frighten  the  National 
Executive  from  interfering  with  the  business  and 
property  interests  of  the  banks.  And  their  resistance, 
whether  successful  or  a  failure,  will  inflict  infinite  harm 
on  many  innocent  people — the  widow,  the  orphan,  the 
workwoman,  and  the  laboring  man. 

Universal  manhood  suffrage  as  represented  in  Con 
gress  is  attempting  to  control  economical  forces  which 
lie  beyond  the  domain  of  government,  and  the  conse 
quence  is  derangement,  disturbance,  and  distress.  The 
Stalwart  Reconstruction  plan  is  based  on  two  false  ideas 
— false  philosophically,  false  historically.  They  are  the 
absolute  equality  of  all  men  in  force  and  vigor,  and  the 
perfect  equality  of  all  races. 

The  attempt  to  engraft  this  system  on  the  stock  of 
Southern  institutions  is  the  cause  of  all  the  disturbance, 
all  the  disorder  which  has  taken  place  there  during  the 
last  fifteen  years. 

Suppose  the  Greenback  party  should  obtain  absolute 
control  of  the  National  Government,  and  of  those  of 
twenty-four  States ;  that  the  leaders  of  that  party 
should  carry  on  a  systematic  and  determined  agitation 
for  the  rights  of  labor  as  against  the  rights  of  property. 
Suppose  all  the  power  of  the  National  Government  and 
of  twenty-four  State  governments  were  concentrated  in 
the  propaganda  of  the  right  of  government  to  control 
society  in  all  its  relations  of  property,  of  labor,  of  the 
family  ;  that  it  taught  the  railroad  men  and  employes 
of  manufacturers  that  they  were  entitled  to  their  fair 


157 

share  of  the  profits  of  their  employers  ;  that  it  dissemi 
nated  its  social  gospel  in  the  great  cities,  that  the  work 
er  is  entitled  to  work,  that  the  duty  of  the  city  is  to 
furnish  him  with  work,  and  that  he  is,  by  his  represent 
atives  in  the  government,  to  fix  the  amount  of  his 
work — by  regulating  the  hours  of  labor,  the  pay  for  his 
work,  by  fixing  his  wages,  and  to  provide  the  money 
for  his  wages  by  taxes  of  his  own  levying  on  property 
not  his  own.  After  this  party  has  thus  exercised  this 
great  power,  and  has  organized  itself  in  New  York  City, 
you  would  behold  a  fair  example  of  what  its  prototype, 
the  Stalwarts,  attempted  in  the  South  from  1867  to  1871. 

You  would  have  societies  of  laborers,  ignorant  and 
impassioned,  led  by  sharp  rascals  of  their  own  order,  or 
who  had  been  expelled  from  the  ranks  above  for  fla 
grant  misconduct.  You  would  see  the  thieves,  the  burg 
lars,  the  dangerous  class  emerge  into  day  and  assert 
their  right  to  share  in  the  luxury  and  self-indulgence 
so  lavishly  displayed  on  every  side.  The  biggest  thief 
would  sport  the  biggest  diamond,  the  greatest  rogue 
the  grandest  equipage  ;  order  would  disappear,  property 
would  dissolve,  and  prosperity  would  wither  in  a  society 
so  agitated  and  so  governed. 

This  is  precisely  what  was  done  in  Charleston  and 
New  Orleans.  The  Legislatures  of  South  Carolina  and 
Louisiana  afford  burlesques  on  parliamentary  proceed 
ings  only  equalled  in  the  opera  bouffe.  But  the  tragic 
lay  close  covered  by  the  comic,  for  this  absurd  travesty 
of  politics  only  concealed  the  corruption  which  eat  up 
the  State  and  destroyed  the  possibility  of  peace. 


15S 


The  Reconstruction  therefore  was  a  crime  against 
philosophy  ;  for  all  men  knew  that  an  inverted  pyramid 
could  not  stand,  and  that  no  society  could  exist  where 
ignorance  and  vice  were  intrusted  with  power,  and 
knowledge  and  virtue  excluded.  The  party  which  in- 
Tented  and  enforced  this  crucifixion  of  States  has  long 
since  abandoned  its  cardinal  dogma  of  equality,  by  ex 
pressly  excluding  the  Chinese  from  the  benefits  of  it, 
so  lavishly  extended  to  the  African.  It  was  a  crime 
against  history  and  science  as  well. 

The  attempt  was  made  to  place  on  a  plane  of  enforced 
equality,  a  race  that  has  been  an  inferior  race  as  long 
as  records  of  mankind  exist  —  a  race  that  has  never 
made  a  step  in  development,  reared  a  monument, 
uttered  a  song,  or  created  an  idea  which  lived. 

Their  theory  is  directly  in  the  face  of  all  modern  in 
vestigation  and  advanced  thought.  It  is  opposed  alike 
to  the  teachings  of  revealed  religion  and  facts,  and 
ascertained  results  of  the  latest  researches  into  the 
origin  and  history  of  man. 

The  great  progress  that  has  been  made  in  the  last 
quarter  of  a  century  in  all  that  relates  to  philology, 
archaeology,  and  natural  history  has  proved  some 
general  propositions  on  which  all  agree,  whether  ortho 
dox  or  scientific.  Whether  the  human  race  was  creat 
ed  by  a  single  creation,  whether  it  descended  from  one 
pair,  whether  it  developed  from  lower  species  by  pro 
gressive  steps  and  in  divers  places,  are  matters  still 
discussed.  But  all  inquirers  agree,  from  Darwin  to  the 
bishops,  that  among  races  of  men  the  greatest  diversity 


159 

exists  ;  that  it  lias  existed  for  at  least  four  or  five 
thousand  years,  ever  since  records  have  possessed  any 
trace  of  men,  and  that  in  that  period  no  change  has 
occurred  in  the  physical  structure  or  the  brain  capacity 
of  each  race. 

The  negroes  on  the  Egyptian  monuments  are  but 
portraits  of  members  of  the  South  Carolina  Legislature. 
The  figures  exhumed  by  Schliemann  from  the  Seven 
Troys  are  counterparts  of  the  modern  Aryan  race. 

The  learned  Professor  Winchell,  of  the  University  of 
Michigan,  summing  up  the  result  of  all  scientific  and 
archaeological  investigation  to  this  date,  arrives  at  the 
conclusion  that  races  develop  in  order  of  power,  and  in 
relation  to  the  epoch  of  creation  in  which  they  live. 

That  each  epoch  is  accompanied  by  a  fauna  and 
flora  suitable  for  that  age  of  development,  and  that 
races  of  men  existed  as  part  of  such  period.  As  time 
progressed,  and  the  changes  took  place  which  geology 
shows  us  did  take  place,  and  the  enormous  plants  and 
prodigious  reptiles  and  great  animals  succeeded  one  after 
another,  so  in  grand  order  came  the  races  of  men,  the 
higher  and  stronger  and  newer  growing  out  of  the 
primary,  weaker,  lower  races.  With  the  first  order  of 
creation,  now  represented  by  thp  tropical  plants  and 
animals,  came  the  black  races  of  Australia  and  Africa  ; 
after  them  came  the  brown  races  of  Asia  and  America  ; 
and  then,  as  the  crowning  act  of  a  grand  development, 
there  sprang  from  the  second  race  the  blossom  of  all 
time,  the  Aryan  blood,  which  for  a  connected  history 
of  four  thousand  years  has  ruled  the  world. 


100 

I  do  not  presume  to  accept  or  deny  these  results,  but 
I  do  assert  that  all  modern  scientific  investigation, 
physical  or  biological,  from  Quatrefages  to  Winchell,  has 
proved  that  different  races  have  different  forces,  and 
that  the  negro  races  are  far  inferior  in  strength  and 
force  to  the  white  or  yellow  races.  I  say,  therefore, 
that  the  attempt  of  the  Stalwart  Reconstructionists  to 
force  political  power  on  a  race  utterly  unable  to  hold 
on  to  it,  and  to  maintain  them  in  the  pretended  enjoy 
ment  of  it,  is  contrary  to  the  order  of  nature.  If  they 
were  to  organize  a  society  in  which  women  alone  were 
to  control,  the  men  would  absorb  the  power  immedi 
ately.  If  they  were  to  provide  that  only  men  between 
ten  and  twenty  should  vote,  the  virtue,  intelligence, 
and  property  of  that  society  would  usurp  the  entire 
and  perfect  management  of  it  at  once. 

Weakness  cannot  rule  strength.  If  political  domin 
ion  is  given  to  the  blacks,  it  will  be  exercised  either  by 
the  people  who  give  it  to  them,  or  by  people  who  are  in 
immediate  connection  with  them. 

In  neither  case  will  the  power  be  used  by  the  blacks. 
They  will  be  but  the  hands  by  which  the  superior  race 
exercises  it. 

Upon  the  whole,  I  desire  to  say  that  when  Mr.  Tour- 
gee  undertakes  to  write  history,  he  establishes  his  right 
to  the  place  that  his  admirers  claim  for  him — to  wit, 
that  of  the  greatest  author  of  fiction  of  the  day. 

WM.  L.  EOYALL. 

NEW  YORK,  Feb.,  1881. 


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